How to Grow Cherries
Prunus avium (sweet) / Prunus cerasus (sour)
Spectacular spring-blooming stone-fruit trees — choose sweet or tart and match the variety to your climate.
By the Plants by Zone Editorial Team · Reviewed June 1, 2026
About cherries
Cherries split into two distinct camps: sweet cherries (Prunus avium), prized for fresh eating, and sour or tart cherries (Prunus cerasus), the choice for pies, preserves, and juice. Sweet cherries thrive in the cool, moderate summers of zones 5–7 and most require two compatible varieties to cross-pollinate; self-fertile types like 'Stella' and 'Lapins' simplify things for small gardens. Tart cherries — especially 'Montmorency' — are hardier (zones 4–8), reliably self-fertile, and generally the more forgiving home-orchard choice.
When to plant and harvest cherries
Timing is relative to your frost dates. Find your USDA zone for exact dates, or browse the month-by-month calendars.
Start seeds indoors
Not applicable — purchase grafted bare-root or container-grown trees
Transplant outdoors
Bare-root trees: plant in early spring before buds break. Container trees: spring or early fall.
Direct sow
Not applicable
Harvest
Late May–June (sweet) to late June–July (sour), depending on zone and variety
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How to grow cherries step by step
- 1
Choose the right type: sour cherries ('Montmorency', 'North Star') are self-fertile and cold-hardy to zone 4; most sweet cherries ('Bing', 'Rainier') need two compatible varieties within 30 ft, or choose a self-fertile type ('Stella', 'Lapins').
- 2
Plant bare-root trees in early spring before buds break in a full-sun site with excellent drainage — waterlogged soil is fatal to cherries.
- 3
Dig a hole as deep as the root system and twice as wide; set the graft union 2–3 in above the soil surface and backfill without amendments.
- 4
Mulch 3 in deep in a wide ring, keeping mulch away from the trunk, and water in well.
- 5
In the first 3 years prune sweet cherries to an open vase and sour cherries to a modified central leader; remove crossing, inward-facing, and dead wood each late spring after harvest.
- 6
Net the canopy or deploy reflective tape before fruit colors — birds find ripe cherries within hours of peak ripeness.
Common problems growing cherries
⚠ Brown rot (soft, furry gray mold on fruit)
Remove all mummified fruit in fall; prune for airflow; apply copper or sulfur at petal fall in wet springs.
⚠ Cherry fruit fly (larvae inside fruit)
Hang sticky red-ball traps at bloom to monitor. Apply Spinosad at petal fall and repeat weekly during the egg-laying window; kaolin clay is an organic deterrent.
⚠ Birds stripping ripe fruit
Exclusion netting draped over the canopy is the only fully reliable method; reflective tape and raptor decoys offer partial protection.
⚠ Bacterial canker (sunken, weeping bark lesions)
Prune only in dry late-summer weather, not during dormancy; sterilize tools between cuts. Avoid mechanical wounds to the bark in wet conditions.
✓ Good companions for cherries
✗ Keep away from
🧺 Harvesting cherries
Sweet cherries are ready when fully colored and taste sweet — taste-test rather than relying on calendar dates alone. Sour cherries are ripe when they pull away cleanly from the stem and the skin is a deep ruby red. Always pick by the stem, not the fruit, to avoid bruising. Process or refrigerate immediately: cherries are highly perishable and do not ripen further once off the tree.
Cherries: frequently asked questions
When should you plant cherries?＋
In most regions you transplant bare-root trees: plant in early spring before buds break. Container trees: spring or early fall.. Timing is relative to your last frost, so find your USDA hardiness zone for the exact planting dates where you live.
Do sweet cherries need a pollinator?＋
Most do — plant two different compatible sweet cherry varieties within 30 ft of each other. Self-fertile exceptions include 'Stella', 'Lapins', 'Sweetheart', and 'Compact Stella'. All sour cherries are self-fertile.
Why didn't my cherry tree bloom or fruit this year?＋
The most common causes are insufficient winter chill hours for your variety, or a late frost that killed the flower buds. Confirm your variety matches your climate's average chill accumulation, and choose a slightly elevated, sheltered site to avoid frost pockets.
Sources & review
Written and maintained by the Plants by Zone Editorial Team. Planting times are based on USDA hardiness zones and NOAA frost-date normals, with care guidance drawn from Cooperative Extension sources. Last reviewed June 1, 2026.
USDA Plant Hardiness Zone MapNOAA U.S. climate normalsCooperative Extension
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