Sweet cherry Heart

Selected from seedlings of free-pollinated selected forms of steppe cherry. Originator — Central Siberian Botanical Garden, SB RAS. Authors: V.S. Simagin, M.N. Salamatov, V.P. Belousova. Under state variety testing since 2000.

The bush is small, 1-1.5 m tall, of medium density, densely leafed. Bark of the trunk is smooth, gray-brown. Shoots are drooping, weakly curved, greenish-brown, light gray the next year, with few buds, yellow-gray, small. Vegetative buds are ovate-acuminate, generative buds are oval, moderately set back from the shoots. Leaves are inversely egg-shaped, 5 x 2.5 cm, green; apex acuminate, base wedge-shaped, serrated with regular teeth; blade folded like a boat, slightly curved, smooth, shiny, not hairy underneath; glands at the base of the blade, small, 2-3 per blade; petiole 1.5 cm long, medium thickness, weakly pigmented. Flowers in umbels of 4-5, 21 mm in diameter, corolla saucer-shaped, petals not fused, white; stigma slightly above the stamens; calyx cup-shaped, sepals round-triangular, without teeth; stamens 12 mm long, pistil 15 mm long. Flowers on one-year-old shoots and flower branches.

Fruit weighing 2.0-2.4 g, 17 mm high, 15 mm wide, 14 mm thick; oval-heart-shaped, shallow wide pit, apex acuminate; skin color dark red, solid; flesh color red, juice dark red; flesh tender, juicy; pedicel 2.7 cm long, thin; stone oval-heart-shaped, weighing 0.12-0.14 g, about 6% of fruit weight, apex acuminate, base rounded, good separation from flesh. Fruits are attractive in appearance, uniform; flesh juicy. Flavor sour-sweet with slight bitterness, acceptable. Fruits contain 13.7% dry matter, 12.2% sugars, 1.8% free acids, 12.7 mg/100g ascorbic acid. Fruit detachment is good. Suitable for harvesting with berry harvesters. Fruits resistant to cracking. Variety for technical purposes. Suitable for producing high-quality jams, compotes, and juice.

Flowering is medium-late, in Novosibirsk at the end of May — beginning of June; ripening is medium-term — after July 25, prolonged; enters fruiting on the 3rd-4th year after planting. Propagated by green cuttings and suckers, stem life 8-9 years.

Fruit production is regular and abundant. Self-sterile, well-pollinated by the 'Salamatovskaya' variety and other simultaneously flowering forms of steppe cherry. Yield 4-6 kg per bush, at planting 3 x 1.5 m yields about 85-130 c/ha.

Mature wood, young shoots and generative buds are highly resistant to winter frosts; flowers are moderately resistant to spring frosts. Drought resistance is high, heat resistance is moderate. Slightly susceptible to coccomyces, moderately resistant to moniliosis, resistant to clasterosporiosis and powdery mildew; resistance to bacterial, viral, and mycoplasma diseases not studied. Slightly affected by gummosis and chlorosis. Moderately damaged by cherry aphid, cherry sawfly, cherry and bird cherry scale, cherry fruitworm; resistance to other pests not studied. Suitable for intensive orchards.

Advantages of the variety: high winter hardiness and yield, suitability of fruits for diverse processing, late flowering.

Disadvantages of the variety: small fruits, self-sterility, insufficient resistance to coccomyces and clasterosporiosis.