why you should plant a cherry tree this year

This post contains affiliate links, but all opinions are my own.

My background is in interior design. I think of design as a puzzle where you’re given a lot of pieces that need to be put together. The most important part of a design is that it performs well; and, you know it’s really a good design when it also looks good. So, when Michael and I first started planning our landscaping at our previous house, we wanted it to be more than just pretty. A standard permaculture principle says that it’s better to grow food than grass. We didn’t take the extreme jump and remove our lawn. But, when we wanted a pretty tree in our front yard, we chose a fruiting cherry tree – they’re beautiful when blooming in the spring and you get cherries. It’s a lovely addition to our yard that grows free food every year.

​We sold that house and moved before the cherry tree produced (you have to give trees two to three years before expecting them to bear fruit). So, you can imagine how excited we were when we discovered that the house we purchased had two well-established cherry trees! We found the cherries a few weeks before we closed on the house, but weren’t comfortable taking any to eat (the house was empty, so the birds and squirrels probably got all the cherries that year).

We basically forgot about the trees until they bloomed the next spring. I was too busy being pregnant with twins and keeping four other little ones alive all day to think about anything outside!

We managed to harvest a few bags of cherries that first spring. I honestly don’t remember what we did with them… maybe we just ate them fresh? But, this year we were prepared. We bought an inexpensive cherry pitter. We eagerly watched the blossoms turn into little green fruits – the petals floating to the ground in a graceful shower. The fruits developed a pinkish hue. We started seeing the birds eating them – a beautiful little flock of golden and brown cedar waxwings were eating them before they were even ripe.

​Then, one morning as I was making my bed, suddenly the tree outside my window seemed to be covered in red jewels peeping from under the leaves. It really happened “over-night” like that! The tree on the west side of the house ripened first; the other one was ready a few days later.

Michael and the Bigs got on the roof to pick the high stuff. I tried to pick the lower fruits while also keeping the younger children off the ladder. Even the Littles are big enough to climb a few rungs on the ladder now. 

Then, I spent a couple hours, with Johanna’s help, pitting cherries and freezing what we couldn’t use right away. Johanna recently learned The Three Little Kittens nursery rhyme. The kittens couldn’t have any pie until they found their mittens, so Johanna digs out her winter mittens each time to wear when eating her pie. Unfortunately, I’m not a fabulous pie-maker yet (I haven’t even attempted to make my own crust since a terrible failure several years ago) but I made a yummy pie with a store-bought crust that evening. Johanna wasn’t the only one who enjoyed it!

Even though we didn’t plant these trees, having food growing on our land provides a sense of well-being and contentment. We appreciate the world that God gave us, see more wildlife, our children learn where food really comes from, and we get to eat more cherry pie than we would have otherwise. Who wouldn’t want fruit trees?

Keeping in mind that fruit trees take a while to establish themselves for fruiting, Michael made sure to plant several more trees that first spring that we lived here. We have several baby fruit trees now to give us fruit throughout the growing season: a few apple varieties, a peach, and a fig (which may not survive a hard winter – we’ll let you know how it goes). One apple and the peach tree look like they’ll have fruit for us this year! Also, our strawberry patch from last year is producing well – that’s another one that you plant and have to wait on…

​So, if you’d like a useful and attractive landscape be sure to plant a fruit tree (or some strawberries) now – you’ll be taking joy in it for years!