Bessey's Cherry: variety description, planting and care, reproduction with photo

Foreign beauty, Bessey's cherry, can be increasingly seen in summer residents' plots and city flower beds. Its ornamental appearance and incredible yield are inherited from the sand cherry native to North America. Unpretentious and accustomed to harsh conditions, the shrub easily takes root in the conditions of the steppe and forest-steppe regions of our country.

History of occurrence

A fairly common low sand cherry shrub can be found in South and North America both in the wild and in garden plots.A very unpretentious and beautiful plant often plays the role of a hedge. Lush long flowering in spring (about three weeks) and bright red foliage in autumn make this culture a frequent resident in flower beds and gardens. The fruits are not used for food due to an unpleasant bitter-tart taste, but are suitable for animal feed.

Botany professor Charles Bessey at the end of the 19th century drew attention to one of the subspecies of sand cherries with tastier and sweeter fruits. He described this plant and began breeding work. Through his labors, several varieties with improved palatability were bred.

In the future, American breeders became interested and continued to work with the shrub, which was named after the scientist Bessey cherry.

Variety description

Cherry, this stone fruit culture was named for the similarity of fruits, but Bessei's closer relatives are plums.In the description of the botanical variety, it is attributed to the genus Microcherry. For cross-pollination, plums, cherry plums, apricots, peaches are suitable. Common cherry is not crossed with varieties of sand and is not grafted.

Appearance

The main decoration of the plant are graceful, dense leaves with a silvery sheen. In spring, the bushes boil with white lace of small flowers, and this splendor lasts about three weeks. In autumn, the foliage turns red in unison and stays on the branches until frost. In the first years, the branches stretch upwards, usually reaching a height of no more than 1.2-1.5 m. Bushes at the age of 6-7 years take a recumbent form.

Throughout the growing season, Bessey's cherry will decorate the site with its "foreign" decorative look.

Fruits

The size of the fruit can be different, from very small - 1.5-2 g, to medium - 2.5-3 g. The flesh is juicy, greenish, often with red streaks.The taste of Bessei may also differ. Copies with sweet drupes without bitterness are valued. But, unfortunately, often seedlings grow even from fruits of good taste and give tart, bitter fruits.

Breeders still have a lot of work to do to secure useful varietal properties. The fruits are deprived of the classic cherry sourness, they resemble the taste of chokeberry.

Yields

What Bessey's cherry boasts of is its amazing yield. The branches are annually covered with fruits, from each adult bush usually comes out at least 5-8 kg of drupes. The fruits do not crumble, ripe cherries that have been waiting for picking may wilt a little, but this makes the taste sweeter and astringency decreases. Flexible branches easily fall under the weight of the crop, so it is advisable to establish a support even before fruiting.

Climatic requirements

Bessey's cherry is valued for frost resistance and drought resistance.At home, she feels great where other stone fruits are not able to grow and bear fruit. Flexible and often lying branches easily wait out severe frosts under a layer of snow. And later, in comparison with other drupes, flowering allows you to avoid spring freezing of the ovary.

Features of cultivation

Bessey's cherry came to us from distant North America, where it grows mostly in arid regions with rocky and sandy soils. Therefore, in caring for plants, you have to follow several rules based on the genetic expectations of this species.

Choosing a landing site

Sunny elevated area is the main condition for the normal growth of Bessei cherry. The plant does not tolerate shading and excessive soil moisture. Even a short-term spring stagnation of water in the soil leads to warming of the bushes. The soil should easily pass moisture, sandy and sandy loamy soils are desirable.In some cases, it is better to lay an additional drainage layer under the future planting.

Landing

Planting cuttings of Bessey's cherry is carried out in early spring, less often in autumn. Soil preparation consists in saturation with humus and sand. For spring planting, pits are best prepared in the fall. Although the plant is famous for its unpretentiousness in the choice of soils, sandy loamy soil with an admixture of humus and compost will be gratefully accepted by Bessey shrubs.

Seedlings are placed at a distance of 1.5-2 m. For each, it is better to form a small mound, which will further protect against rotting.

It is easy to grow this type of "microcherry" by sowing fresh or overwintered seeds in moist soil. Bessey is characterized by high seed germination, usually more than half of the seeds give he althy seedlings. After germination, the plant quickly forms a developed root and does not require complex care.In the second year, the seedlings are ready for transplanting to a permanent place.

Council. It is better to plant more seeds in order to select specimens with acceptable taste berries.

Care

Cherry Bessey is unpretentious and undemanding in care, we list the main activities:

• watering and fertilizing;
• loosening and weeding;
• bush formation (pruning).

The bush owes its frost resistance to a large extent to the property of falling to the ground under the weight of snow. In winters with little snow, it makes sense to rake up the snow yourself to avoid bare and freezing branches.

Irrigation and fertilization

Bessey's cherry tolerates drought easily, but lack of water can affect the quality of the fruit.Therefore, 2-3 waterings per season are recommended, after flowering and during fruit ripening. Complex mineral dressing is applied in early spring. In autumn, shallow digging is carried out with the addition of humus and compost. Useful 2-3 complex mineral foliar top dressing per season.

Loosening and weeding

The root system of Bessey's cherry is shallow and does not tolerate oxygen starvation. After each watering, a shallow loosening of the soil is recommended. Regular removal of weeds will prevent most of the possible diseases of the plant.

Important. Clogged plantings of Bessey shrubs suffer from shading, are prone to overheating and infection.

Shaping a bush

The main harvest is formed on last year's growth. Branches over 4-5 years old branch poorly, almost do not bear fruit, and are prone to falling off. Therefore, the formation of the bush consists in the annual rejuvenation of the plant, pruning the old branches of the Bessey cherry.

Young seedlings after planting are cut off the upper part of the main branch to immediately provoke the growth of side shoots. He althy cherries do not form shoots, sometimes a heavily frozen old bush can give several root suckers for rejuvenation. Parts of the plant frozen after the winter are cut off without a doubt, Bessey will quickly give new he althy shoots.

Reproduction

Cherry Bessey does not give shoots, so reproduction occurs at the expense of seedlings from seeds or layering. Seed germination is very good. Seedlings form a full-fledged root system already in the first year, and the first flowering is possible in the second year.

Important. Unfortunately, seedlings often do not retain the good taste of their parent bushes, so selection will have to be made.

To form layering, bend a branch, secure with a hairpin and sprinkle with moist soil. It will take root very quickly and be ready to be transplanted to a permanent place.

Bessey's cherry has proved to be an excellent rootstock for plums, peaches, felted cherries and other stone fruits. The root of the shrub is located on the surface and has a weak "anchor". Therefore, for heavy grafts, the construction of a support is necessary. Bessey cherry easily crosses with various varieties of plums, forming a cherry plum hybrid. In such a plant, the root is more powerful, and it is used as a stock. The hybrid reproduces only by layering, since the seedlings from the stone will carry the genes of only one of the parents.

Hybrids of Bessei with cherry plum and felt cherries are characterized by high yields and good resistance to difficult climatic conditions.

Diseases and pests

Bessey's cherry has proven to be resistant to stone fruit diseases. The risk of infections increases when landing conditions and care rules are not followed:

• high humidity;
• heavy clay soils;
• low light;
• poor ventilation;
• rare weeding;
• stagnation of meltwater, close occurrence of groundwater.

A serious disease in rainy years is perforated spotting (clasterosporiasis). The fight against infection is carried out by spraying the bushes with Bordeaux liquid before and after flowering. Useful foliar copper-containing top dressing. Planted in an elevated open sunny area, Bessey will delight gardeners with a he althy look and an annual bountiful harvest. In general, the culture for our country is young and promising. A lot of selection work is ahead to secure a subspecies with good taste.

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