microclimates, fruit varieties 4zone7, Montmorency cherries

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JAnnetteW Philadelphia, MS Jan 24, 2010

I am not really a beginning gardener, but I am new to growing cherries. Local folks around here say they cannot be grown at all, and that I should not even try, but I have found out a few things since I started researching cherries grown in central Mississippi, and I would like to share it with somebody. The problem starts with trying to glean information off the internet from growers who almost all live north of my zone. They give advice to each other, and it is not made for southern gardeners. They say things that are confusing because they are instructing people to avoid frost pockets while southern gardeners may need to seek them out. They think they have the most chill hours, and maybe they do, but in my area I think there are a lot of chill hours also. Most fruit trees need chill hours to go dormant so that the tree will know that it is indeed winter before it can blossom in the spring. These are many hours spent with temperatures between freezing and 45 degrees F. Anything below that range is not considered a chill hour, and anything above that is not a chill hour either. However, hours that are above 60 degrees F may subtract from the hours well spent in the right range. That range of chill hours is typically the daily low temperatures for my climate. It is not the typical daily high temperatures. I think that people in my area who get a tree which is better suited for a colder climate might be advised to shelter the trees during our hot afternoons which may even rise unseasonably into the eighties, but the best news that I have discovered is that I worried about my expensive investment of one tree that cost twenty five dollars over nothing. It is a Montmorency tree, and I have a friend who says that it is the kind to get here because a county agent once told her that. New varieties are being developed for the South, and this is just one of them. So my advice to new cherry growers in warm climates is to not listen to the ones who try to discourage but be persistent and find out what you really want to know.

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