Topic: No cherries this year, no bees?

[dtw]

My cherry tree hasn't produced much fruit this year, (4 cherries to be exact).
Could this be due to the mysterious disappearance of bees this year?
I normally get about 4lbs per branch, there was plenty of blossom earlier in the year.

Or could it be something else?
BTW  I haven't pruned it since I got it 6 years ago.

[saddad]

Did you get caught by that late frost? My two new trees have produced, but the early one, Summer Sun? Only produced half a dozen but the one next two it has about fifty...  :-\

[manicscousers]

ours got caught by the frost,2 cherries and both split in all the rain lately  :-\

[Bryan]

Hi dtw,
Cherries are hard to come by nowadays! ;D ;D Sorry, wrong subject.
I did see the Kent growers selling them off really cheap last weekend when i went to Margate for the day. They have not had any shortage this year, apparently they have had a btter picking this year than they have for the last few.
May be the last frosts, as has been posted previously.

[DAVIESFOZZIE]

I ive in Caerphilly and i thought the same as you a lack of bees to polinate my runner beans but i have nothing but admiration for our bees as we have some of the worst weather in the uk but even last wednesday which poured down all day at least 5 or six bees were busy pollinating my beans plus my next door neighbour has a good crop of cheerys. Perhaps its something else putting off the bees

[Suzanne]

I don't know whether it was the cold spring which delayed the birds raising their young this year or not, but they have been extra busy now - I have lost a lot of soft fruit this year to marauding birds. From 6 redcurrant bushes i have only managed to get one small punnet - the birds are picking them before they are ripe.

I am definitely going to invest in a fruit cage.

this probably isn't the same problem for you as i gather from your thread that you had no fruot developing?

[Robert_Brenchley]

Cherries flower too early for honeybees, so I'd say that was simply down to the cold spring. Runner beans aren't pollinated by honeybees as the nectar is too far down inside the flower for them to reach. Sometimes bumblebees bite through and make a hole to reach the honey, which doesn't pollinate the flower. Honeybees will then use the holes, if there are enough to make it worth their while.

[PurpleHeather]

Cherry, plum and greengage have been dismal this year but the apples (which blossom later) have made up for it. Black berries are full too so it is going to be an apple and black berry year.

We have put it down to the cold at blossom time. Lots of insects will do the work of pollinating, crawling ones and the flying type.

It is nice to see the bees at work though and it is a shame that there are so few at the moment.

[ACE]

Loads on the red, but nothing on the black ???

[saddad]

My Plums and gages have set well......  :-\

[jennym]

Very few plums this year, but cherries are fantastic  ;D - have been picking good quantities for the last few weeks, but they're finishing now:

[Robert_Brenchley]

My plums aren't too good either. The weather warmed up before the tree finished flowering, but it was too late for a lot of the flowers. Any more cold weather, I'd have missed out on the crop altogether.