How to Pick Young Cherries

A young cherry tree planted in the spring of the year will use its first growing season to gain strength and size. During the second growing season, the young tree may produce some blossoms; during the third growing season, expect a bevy of blossoms. Cherry trees usually drop immature fruit naturally -- called fruit drop. After cherry trees thin themselves, they are ready to develop delicious cherries for picking later in the growing season.

Bucket
Ladder (optional)

Instructions

- 1
  Watch the cherry tree as the cherries grow to mature size and the color deepens. Different cherry cultivars will produce cherries of varying color, from light red to a deep burgundy. The best indicator of cherry maturation is fruit drop. When the cherry tree begins to drop mature cherries, harvest them.
- 2
  Pull off the cherry clusters, leaving the stems attached to the cherries. As you pull the cherry clusters from the tree, do not remove the fruit spurs attached to the branches of the tree. Fruit spurs are the tiny twigs that hold the stems.
- 3
  Place the cherry clusters into the bucket as you pick them. Handle the cherries carefully to avoid bruising or crushing them.
- 4
  Continue picking the tree, using a ladder to reach the highest cherries if necessary, until you harvest all of the mature cherries. Pick all of the cherries that have similar size and color, leaving the immature cherries to ripen for another day or two.
- 5
  Repeat the same picking process every other day for at least one week until you pick all of the cherries from the cherry tree.

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