Sweet cherry Beauty of Kuban

The variety was developed at the North Caucasus Regional Institute of Horticulture and Viticulture (Krasnodar) by M.A. Kolesnikov; origin is unknown. It is widely known and popular in the southern horticulture zone. It was officially registered in 1959 and approved for use in the North Caucasus region.

Medium-sized tree with a dense, rounded, slightly compressed crown, well-leafed. Shoots are light brown with a silvery sheen. Vegetative buds are dark brown, sharply pointed, and conical; generative buds are oval and lag behind the shoots. Leaves are large, elongated-oval in shape. The upper leaf surface is smooth; the lower surface is slightly pubescent and flat. The petiole has two large, oval, light-red glands. Flowers are arranged in clusters of 2-3, large, with a dish-shaped corolla; petals are broadly inverted-oval, white, overlapping one another. The stigma is long and positioned both above and below the anthers. The calyx is cup-shaped with no toothed calyx lobes. Blooms and fruits on bouquet branches (77%) and on the previous year’s shoot bases (23%).

Fruits are large (average weight 6.5-7.5 g), broad-heart-shaped (2.2 x 2.3 x 2.0), with a rounded apex, slightly compressed and shallowly indented, medium-width depression. Light cream-colored with a delicate blush, very beautifully colored. Flesh is creamy, juicy, medium density, with excellent harmonious flavor (taste score 4.6), juice is colorless. Flesh content reaches up to 93.7% of fruit mass. Stone is above average size, oval, light beige, apex and base rounded, poorly separates from flesh. Pedicel is medium length and thickness, detaches from fruit with medium force and has a semi-dry detachment. Fruits contain 14.6% dry matter, 10.0% sugars, 0.73% acids, 9.6 mg/100g ascorbic acid.

Flowering and fruit ripening are early and simultaneous (late May — early June). It begins fruiting at age 5-6 years. Self-sterile. High yield, average 80.0 t/ha.

Belongs to the group of most winter-hardy varieties; wood is rarely damaged; flower buds are only damaged in severe winters; insufficient frost resistance. Good drought tolerance.

Weakly susceptible to clasterosporiosis and coccomyces, but affected by gray rot, especially during prolonged rainy weather during ripening; not affected by cherry fly.

Main use: dessert; possible use in technological processing.

Advantages: high winter hardiness, early ripening, sufficiently large fruits of excellent taste.

Disadvantages: delicate, poorly transportable fruits, insufficient resistance to gray rot.