Felted cherry

This remarkable plant has been grown for decades in the territories of the former Soviet Union. It has several names: Nanking cherry, fluffy, Ando, Tomentoza, but its most famous name is felt cherry. The native land of the plant is North China, where it can still be found in the wild. It is also distributed in Japan and Korea.

Felt cherry this plant is called because its leaves and fruits are covered with a gentle fluff. It refers to fast-growing, drought-tolerant and high-yielding crops. The height of the plant rarely exceeds 2.5 m. Most often it grows like a small tree or thick bush. The culture is frost-resistant. Felted cherry usually blooms before other stone fruits. Its beautiful flowers are able to withstand frost to -3 ° C. This plant looks wonderful during flowering in early spring. All its branches are covered with white flowers, which have a delicate aroma, attracting bees and bumblebees.

Very decorative look these trees in the period of ripening of bright red fruits, which are abundantly covered with branches. They ripen from June to July. The berries are slightly smaller than in the ordinary cherry; Are located on short pedicels. They are sweetish and have a very delicate flesh. The berries are fresh or cooked with juice, compotes, jams and jams. They improve digestion and appetite.

This fruit culture is often used as a dwarfish rootstock. On a felt cherry you can plant a peach, cherry plum, plum, apricot. The grafted plants enter the fruiting phase much earlier and do not reach large sizes, which facilitates the care of them. Grafted on the seedling cherry felt other cultures begin fruiting for 3 years.

Felted cherry, the care of which begins from the moment of planting, is well multiplied by seeds, graft and layers. Germination of seeds is very high, so problems with growing seedlings, as a rule, do not arise. Peeled from the juicy pulp dried in the shade and stored in a cool place. In September, they are mixed with sand and placed in a cool. Before the onset of frost, they are sown in fertile soil for 2 cm. After sowing seeds, the pits are sprinkled with a small layer of a mixture consisting of peat, sawdust, leaf land, humus. With proper care for the following summer, the seedlings can grow to a height of 1 m. Stratified seeds of this cherry can also be sown in the spring.

The varietal properties of cherry felt are perfectly preserved when multiplying by layers and cuttings. Cuttings should preferably be carried out in a greenhouse. Cuttings are harvested in July from twenty-centimeter fragments of shoots with 3-4 internodes. The cuttings are lowered with the lower end into a solution of heteroauxin (growth promoter) and kept for 12 hours, then they are washed and planted in the ground. The period of rooting lasts up to 30 days. Cuttings for winter are insulated. Felt cherry propagates and horizontal layers.

Care of this plant consists in rejuvenating pruning (after 6 years), regular cutting of shoots, removal of damaged branches. This plant can be affected by fungal disease - moniliosis. At the same time young shoots with an ovary and leaves dry up. The remedy for this disease is spraying a cherry before flowering 1% of the Bordeaux liquid.

During the years of cultivation of this plant, many of its varieties have been developed, which possess a variety of qualities. Cherry felt, whose varieties are domestic and foreign, suitable for cultivation throughout Russia, where frost does not exceed -25 ° C. The most popular among gardeners are such domestic varieties as "felt pink" and "felt red," the earliest "," light "," Khabarovsk "," amurka ".