My cherries are drying up and falling off,
is this due to lack of water or something else?
What size is the tree? Young trees sometimes start to form fruit, and then drop it.
The "June drop" is a tree's way of thinning out its fruit so that the rest develops well. Is there any fruit left on your tree?
My morello cherry tree is doing the same. It flowered well and had lots of fruit swelling up till a week ago when most turned yellow with a reddish hue and are now dropping off. Very disappointed, but I think it may well be due to lack of water. The tree spent three years in a huge container until last Autumn when it was transferred to the ground.
I've also lost two of my blueberries - probably due to lack of water these past weeks.
Tricia
my tree started to go down hill with the blossom. It was beautiful, then I think it was hit by the frost. Now I do have a few cherries, but the leaves seen to be curling and the blossom is brown and not falling off.
Yes, cherries need extra water when bearing a crop - unless your tree is in splendid isolation in rich moist soil.
Particularly important for cherries on a dwarfing rootstock.
Any kind of root competition can mean the root system will be water-limited - only able to support growth not fruiting (mine is on a boundary with a neighbour's collection of weed trees - ash, blackthorn, sycamore - pretty much a full house).
The ideal solution is a dripfeed - probably only a couple of litres an hour while the fruit is swelling and ripening - this is easily arranged by leaving your hose head trickling a drop or two a second right next to the tree.
Best done by tweaking the tap end - much safer in case the continuous pressure finds a weak hose connector and floods the area!
It's only for a week or so and you can shut it off at night.
I was told this by the RHS Fruit Group - it works like magic.
Cheers.
I bought it 10 years ago, and it's been producing fine until this year.
It is on dwarf rootstock, I think it's apple.
The soil is pretty poor.
We had some rain last night, so that may help.
I don't have an outside tap, so I can't do the drip thing, but I'll give it a water every night.
I thought it was ok, as the leaves are fine.
I think this is the first year I haven't been infested with blackfly.
It`s happening here as well I suspect cold nights when it was in blossom and then a drought didn`t help
what variety is it? some, such as Lapins/Cherokee are known to drop a lot of cherries, just like the June drop with apples. Stella and Sweetheart are also a bit 'droppy' but I wouldn't worry too much - as long as you can give it some extra water, there will still be plenty of cherries - unless you have piratical blackbirds, when you will have none without some defences.
Yep, here too. Not many cherries. Ours is a Stella.
I think the problem is that towards the end of flowering we had a frost. According to today's Telegraph weather watch May was the coldest for about 10 years.
I think the frost nipped the flowers in the bud. ;D ???
valmarg
Mine are Stella.
My cats keep the pesky birds away.
They are recovering now after all that rain we had, the fruits are shiny and some are ripening too. :)