Suckering Black Cherries

[GlennCz]

I am marking my property with my logger, we just got done marking another area and marked 35 black cherries to harvest.  So me and my logger have a dialogue, where I am trying to save trees and he is trying to cut them, but I make all decision and I think the forest is benefiting from our work.

One of the criteria that we use on cherry is the suckering.   My logger is always using that as a reason to cut, because the more suckering and the further down, the less healthy the tree is and the more of a chance of red rot.  And I have seen the many stumps and logs that we cut that have alot of red rot.  So I am going along with this, and am using suckering as a criteria of wether to cut or not.  Of course, I am looking at other factors too, like competition, size of tree for age, but log straight, bark marks, defects, etc etc.   

My question, when I see suckers coming down to 20 ft, is that a pretty good reason to make this a tree to cut?

[Ron Wenrich]

If you trust your logger, go with his instincts.  I've found over the years that by talking to loggers or sawyers, they know more about the inside of a tree than most foresters or landowners. 

It all depends on experience. 

[SwampDonkey]

I don't know about the relationship of suckering to rot in cherry. But, I know that the bark appearance on white spruce and fir will tell you if it has butt rot and I learned that from loggers I've talked with and it's been a true indicator 99 % of the time.  8)

[GlennCz]

>by talking to loggers or sawyers, they know more about the inside of a tree

that's for sure, we spent another hour marking today, and those words were ringing in my head, because i'd be pointing at trees and he'd be telling me what he thinks they probably look like inside.

the trees in my woods just don't look as good as they did when i started this project.  holes, rot, suckers, crooked, split, bird peck, the list goes on and on.

[Ron Wenrich]

Do you know what kind of past treatment your woods has had?  You might have put this up before, but I forgot.  What you have on the ground now is pretty dependent of past practices.

[SkidrowJoe]

Hey Glenn,

Suckering or epidormic growth is usually a response to an injury, stress, decline, etc all of which are not great for the tree, making the this the sign of heart rot that you describe.  But, not all suckering is associated with heart rot.