July 25, 2007 : Estelle and Duane's Bali Cherry

Our neighbor Estelle called up the other day wondering if we wanted to take a picture of her Bali Cherry tree, which was just loaded. They had wrapped cheesecloth loosely around the tree, and somehow that had dissuaded the birds that normally raid their tree. (We had several trees nearly as loaded when I left for the Bailey trip last Tuesday, and when I checked on Thursday nearly all of the cherries had vanished.)

Bali Cherries are, so far, the only cherry tree hardy enough to bear in our Zone 3 climate. They are a sour cherry, not like Bing's, but are fun to eat off the tree and make legendary pie. Our Bali Cherry, which we buy in from Bailey Nurseries, are currently budded onto a Mazzard Cherry rootstock. In my mind Mazzard Cherries are of dubious hardiness, which might explain why some people have reported Bali's dying over winter. If I can find a suitable own-root source of Bali Cherry I will switch.

Estelle and Duane are wonderful people and good Minnesotans. It was a perfect sunny, breezy, blue-skied day to go have a little visit and snap a few pictures. As I was leaving Estelle declared her intention of picking some raspberries, of which they'd had a bumper crop this year. She disappeared into the barn and emerged with a wheelbarrow, which seemed optimistic even for the best of raspberry years.