Cherry Tree Planting Guide: Varieties, Pollination, Growing & More!

This post is in collaboration with my friends at Stark Bro’s, my #1 online source for fruit and nut trees, shrubs and other edible plants. All opinions and words are my own.

I absolutely adore cherries! If you want a cherry tree in your own yard like me, stick around. Today I’m planting one on my new espalier. We’ll go over how, when and where to plant along with soil prep, watering, fertilizer and variety tips.

How Cherry Trees Grow

First, before we dive into planting, I always like to explain a little about the plant first, so we know what we’re getting into here.

Cherry trees are deciduous trees, meaning they lose their leaves every year. In the spring, they grow gorgeous white or pink flowers, so definitely a valuable landscape tree in its own right.

Depending on whether you have a dwarf, semi-dwarf or full-size variety, and how you prune it cherries can grow 8-30 feet high with the same width.

Like most fruit trees, their size is controlled by their rootstock, the type of roots that the tree has been grafted onto. This can be a little confusing because you can buy the same variety with different rootstocks.

I have a Lapins cherry variety from Stark Bro’s on a dwarf rootstock, so this guy should top out at 14 feet. Dwarf cherry varieties like this one are also great if you want a potted patio plant.

Cherry tree can live anywhere between 10 to 150 years. Big range, I realize! This is mostly based on the rootstock, whether it’s on its own roots, and how kind your climate is to your new tree.

If you’re planting a 1-2 year old tree, you’ll get cherries within 2-5 years. The cherry fruits, called drupes, are ready to harvest in mid-summer and can be yellow-red, bright red, or dark red depending on the variety.

Climate

Cherry trees are native to Europe, west Asia and northern Africa, so solid temperate climates. In the U.S. sweet cherries can be planted in zones 4-8 and tart cherries in zones 7-9.

Cherries are part of the Prunus plant genus, which encompasses other stone fruits like nectarines, plums, peaches and almonds. None of these fruits do well in hot areas because, to thrive, they require a certain amount of time every year, in cold weather, below 45ºF.

If you’re in a hotter climate, try Lapins or any of these varieties, all rated for USDA Zone 9.

Winter resets these trees. It’s like their winter spa time. This yearly spa time is referred to as chill hours. (Yo, please do not go to the nursery and ask about winter spa time, because you did not hear this from me then.)

Sweet cherries usually need 700-800 hours per year, about 28-32 days in a row. Sour cherries need 1200 hours, about 50 days. So, if you have a good solid winter, cherries might be for you!

My Lapins sweet cherry variety needs 400 hours, definitely below average. But that makes me feel a little better because our winters have been very mild lately.

Pollination

All cherries, whether they’re tart or sweet, will produce more with another cherry tree. That being said, many tart cherries and some sweet cherries are self-fruitful, meaning they can produce fruit without a fruit buddy. (Also, “fruit buddy” is another term you should not take to the nursery. That’s just between you and me. #justsayin)

The remaining cherry varieties that aren’t self-fruitful, you’ll need the aforementioned fruit buddy. Unfortunately not just any old cherry tree will do. Tart and sweet cherries can’t pollinate each other. Some varieties are universal pollinators, but some don’t match up at all.

Your best bet is to check out the plant tag, which will usually list a) if the tree needs a pollinator, and b) which varieties are recommended. A well-staffed local nursery should be able to help you choose a matching variety, too. My favorite source, online nurseries, do a really outstanding job listing all the varieties that will pollinate the one you’re looking at.

Stark Bro’s for instance, has a whole section at the bottom of every webpage listing the suggested varieties and also tells you whether or not the variety needs pollination.

I have been buying plants online from Stark Bro’s since we bought our house in 2011 and one of the main reasons is because, as a child of the internet, I require a lot of information before I make purchases—especially if it’s a food-bearing item sitting in my front yard that my neighbors and I are going to look at for a few decades! Knowing I’m making a good pollination decision is absolutely priceless when I’m buying fruit trees.

In my case, my garden is small, and I didn’t really have room to dedicate to TWO cherry trees. I did install two espalier trellises on my house, but I’m reserving that other one for a peach tree. So, I specifically went shopping for a variety that didn’t require a pollinator and got the Lapins cherry tree.

Varieties & Types

Ok, so NOW that we have a good idea of all the different things to look for in a cherry tree, let’s drill down into the different types and varieties and how to choose one.

Cherries are in the rose plant family, called Rosacea, and the genus is Prunus. There are almost 50 species in the Prunus genus called “cherry” in some way. Cherry blossom trees and weeping cherries, for instance, while beautiful and in the Prunus family, do not produce good cherry fruits, if any. Dwarf cherries, Prunus fruticosa, and Nanking cherries, Prunus tomentosa, do produce a sour edible fruit, but not likely what most people think of when they say “cherry.” What we want are Prunus avium or Prunus cerasus.

Prunus avium are the sweet cherries you see in the grocery store produce section and eat fresh. Prunus cerasus are called sour, tart or pie cherries and they’re used for baking, most famously cherry pies.

Once you decide if you plan on eating cherries fresh or baking with them you can narrow down to sweet or tart cherries.

Popular varieties of sweet cherries include Bing, Black Tartarian and Ranier. Popular tart cherries include Montmorency, Meteor, and North Star.

If you’re looking for a yellow variety, check out Emperor Francis and Napoleon Royal Ann, both sweet cherries.

And if you’re looking for a sweet cherry that doesn’t require pollination, like me, Lapins and Stella are both great options.

If you’re still unsure about the best variety for you, here’s a full variety list, broken down by zones, type, pollination, fruit color, sizes, and links to purchase. And if you guys have had luck with a certain variety let us all know about it and your climate in the comments!

Planting Seeds

Let’s talk about planting from seed, because I know there’s going to be questions. Can you plant a cherry seed? Yes.

It is less expensive than buying a tree, but there’s a lot of extra steps, like crazy steps, involving cold stratifying, and pliers, just babying this thing, and then the extra years of waiting. Plus, unless you’re very sure of the donor tree, its variety, and whether it’s on a rootstock, there is gonna be a lot of questions about how this tree is gonna turn out when it’s mature.

So, my opinion is, especially if you don’t have time or room to spare, buy the right tree, the right variety, and the right rootstock, from the start.

Sun & Location

Once we have our cherry tree, the next thing we need to do is find a good location. First off, if you’re planting a pollinator variety, make sure the two trees are within 100 feet of each other.

Like most fruit trees, cherries do best with full sun, which is minimum 6 hours of direct sun, preferably 8 hours. Not dappled sun, not indirect sun reflecting off the side of your house, but full-on beach sun that burns if you forget to put on your sunscreen. That’s direct sun.

If you can put it in an area where it’s protected from wind, even better.

Sweet cherries, because they flower early in spring, are prone to frost damage. So, if you have a choice, also avoid low spots or other microclimates on your property that might be colder than other areas.

The area on the front of my house gets blasted by sun all day. That’s why my garden’s in my front yard. Also, because it’s on this wall, it will be protected by wind, and the warmth from the brick wall will protect it from cold.

Soil Drainage & Compost

Because they’re prone to root rot, cherries do best in well-draining, but moist soil. Some examples of bad draining soil would be heavy clay soil and rocky soil, which hold onto water for a long time. On the other hand, sandy soil drains too quickly, leaving the soil too dry.

If you can’t plant in another spot, the solution to both of these problems is adding compost to the soil. I have two compost bins running at all times, and compost is my favorite amendment. There is just no better example of upcycling than taking food and yard waste and turning it into premium garden amendments.

You can also add other types of organic matter like leaves, straw, or wood chips, as long as you have time to wait for it to decompose before planting, minimum a year. All organic matter is going to add nutrients to the soil, so extra bonus there!

Soil pH & Amendments

It’s really tough to change the surrounding soil pH once the tree is in the ground, because you don’t want to disturb the roots. So, for perennials like fruit trees, it’s especially important to get the soil pH right in the beginning.

You can use a liquid test kit or digital pH tester to see where your soil is currently. Make sure to test multiple places around the area you plan on planting.

Cherries prefer a slightly acidic soil with a pH between 6.2 to 6.8. If your soil is higher than this, add sulfur or a soil acidifier. If it’s lower, add lime.

Make sure to work all the amendments, including any organic matter, into the soil at least several inches with a garden fork or shovel.

Fertilizer

One thing you don’t need to worry about adding at planting time is fertilizer. Cherry trees don’t actually require a lot of fertilizer. They’re considered light feeders.

Unless you’ve done a soil test or have reason to believe your soil is seriously lacking, you won’t need to add fertilizer until the tree starts bearing fruit. Or, if you don’t see a lot of green growth the first spring after planting, you can start fertilizing annually.

When To Plant

As with most things, the best time to plant cherry trees is in the spring, preferably early to mid-spring, before the buds break on the dormant tree.

I don’t know if you guys are like me, though, but spring is pretty busy! All these checklists and nurseries want you plant everything in spring, but I can’t do everything in spring!

So if that’s your situation, too, good news is that cherry trees can be planted anytime the soil can be worked. So no, not when the ground is frozen, not when it’s covered with 2 feet of snow, or when it’s a muddy compacted mess from 3 days of rain, but if your soil is dry or moist and can be dug, you’re good to go.

It’s fall here, late November in U.S. Zone 7A, and I’m planting my dormant cherry tree. If you plan to plant in the cold like me, one word about that. You don’t want the roots exposed to freezing temperatures, below 32ºF (0ºC). So if it’s super cold, just wait for a warmer day and make sure to get the plants in the ground as soon as possible to prevent root injury.

Spacing & Espalier

Where exactly you put the tree within your planting area depends on how big you expect your tree to get. The best source for this info is the nursery or the plant tag that came with your tree.

If you don’t have the tag, you can estimate based on the rootstock. Dwarf sweet and sour cherries should be spaced 8-10 feet apart, Semi-dwarf sweet 15-18 feet and sour cherries 12-15 feet apart, And full-size sweet cherries 18-25 feet and full-size sour cherries 15-18 feet apart.

My tree is a dwarf and I’m actually going to be planting it flat on this frame here on the front of my house. This is a technique called espalier, and it saves A LOT of room. My garden’s not tiny, but it’s smaller than all the ideas I have, so I’m super excited about trying this out.

If you’re doing espalier you can space your cherry tree much closer to other espaliers than a standard tree. The exact distance will depend on the design you choose. It should be 6-12” away from the wall or frame, though. I’ll be keeping all my herbs here in front of it, too, though I’m probably gonna transplant this currant bush.

Dwarf and semi-dwarf fruit trees are perfect for training in the espalier method. If you’re looking to do an espalier cherry like this, these are some great varieties to choose from.

I am not an expert in espalier, but definitely comment below if you want me to update you guys on this journey and what your questions are. And also comment if you’ve done espalier before and have some tips! Because believe me, I have a lot of questions!

I’m gonna be doing the same thing with a peach tree on the other side of this window, so I should have some good info to share as early as next year on this whole process.

How to Plant

Once you got your spot, it’s time to dig the hole!

If your tree is potted like mine, dig the hole about 1 ½ to 2 times the pot size. Pull the tree out of the pot and break apart the roots a bit to encourage them to grow into the surrounding soil. Place the soil and roots into the hole, keeping the soil in the pot the same level as your planting site.

For bareroot trees, make the hole about 2 feet deep by 2 feet wide. Soak the roots of bareroot trees for several hours ahead of time. Then make sure the roots are spread out well in the hole.

Backfill the hole with whatever soil you removed from the area, hopefully previously amended!

For both bareroot and potted, it’s important to make sure the graft union, where the cherry tree is grafted to its rootstock at the bottom part of the tree, is at least 1-2 inches above the ground. You can usually tell where the union is because there’s a big bump or sometimes the bottom portion is larger or looks like a different quality, which it is!

The reason we what to make sure that’s above the soil is because we don’t want the top portion of the tree to try to set roots into the ground. We just want the rootstock to grow roots.

Once that’s done, tamp the soil down to remove any air pockets.

Watering

Once your tree is in the ground, either bare root or potted, water it well. This reduces transplant shock for the roots and settles the soil.

If you notice the water is not staying around the tree, you can also build a little soil hill around the tree at this point. This will help keep the water in place while it sinks into the ground.

Cherry trees need about an inch of water every 10 days or so. They don’t like waterlogged soil, though, so a good way to tell if you’ve watered enough is to stick your finger in the soil. It should feel moist several inches down.

Mulching

Mulching your cherry tree is another way to prevent water runoff and conserve moisture. An added bonus is that it also reduces weed or grass growth around your tree where it could compete with the new tree roots.

When you apply the mulch, make sure to keep it away from the base of the tree, where it could cause rotting or fungal growth.

My favorite mulch materials are wood chips, leaves, or coarse compost, but you can use any rough organic material you have access to like straw or bark.

And with that, our cherry tree is successfully planted! Let me know in the comments, what you guys want to hear about next on these cherries.

Looking to Plant Cherries?

I have a huge non-producing cherry tree in my shady backyard. Getting a cherry tree, to me, was unattainable because I thought these trees were so big! I honestly had no idea that I could squeeze a small cherry tree into my front yard and actually get homegrown cherries. It wasn’t until I really started looking around at all the cherry varieties available at online nurseries like Stark Bro’s, that I realized it was totally doable. No matter the space you have, you can likely find something!

I’ve been buying from Stark Bro’s for almost 15 years, long before the ReSprout YouTube channel and this website existed or either was even an idea. Some of the first plants I got from them were my blackberries, my strawberries, my blueberry hedge, my raspberries, my potato seeds, and my sweet potato slips. And this list grows every year! (Because there seems to always be just a little more room!)

Stark Bro’s is a crazy old company—over 200 years old—and it absolutely blows my mind that, in this day of global conglomerates, Stark Bro’s remains a private company with the Stark family still actively involved. It’s a “mom and pop shop” with the stability and legacy of weathering every economic up-and-down since 1816. As I place my plant orders every year, that has always given me the warm fuzzies. I know that if I have a question or problem they’ll be there.

One of my other favorite things about Stark Bro’s (and probably how I originally found them) is that they offer tons of USDA-certified organic plants. While it is tough to be 100% organic, I try my best to support organic agriculture when I can, and to plant and garden organically when possible. Their organic North Star sour cherry is a great option if you’re looking for an organic cherry tree.

If you are in the market to buy cherries, or any other fruit tree, nut tree, berry or edible garden plant, I highly recommend Stark Bro’s. I’m so excited to be partnering with them on this post. Stay tuned for more with them soon!

This post is sponsored by Stark Bro’s. View the full ReSprout advertising disclosure.

Sources

• Planting Cherry Trees, Stark Bro’s
• How to Grow Cherry Trees, Stark Bro’s
• What are some best practices when planting a cherry tree?, University of Maine Extension
• Cherries in the Garden and the Kitchen, Penn State Extension
• Spring Fruit Tree Planting Tips for the Home Garden, Penn State Extension
• Cherries, University of Illinois Extension
• Sweet Cherry (Prunus avium), North Carolina State Extension
• Growing Stone Fruits in the Home Garden, University of Minnesota Extension
• Cherry Tree Chilling Requirements, University of California Agriculture & Natural Resources
• Cherry, Wikipedia
• Growing Cherries in the Home Garden, Iowa State University Extension and Outreach
• Growing Cherries in Virginia, Virginia Cooperative Extension
• Choosing a Location for Cherry Trees, Stark Bro’s
• Espaliered Fruit Trees, Portland Nursery