Our neighbor had a couple of cherry trees; they eventually died a while back, but for a few years before that she let us pick cherries off of them. They always produced well, and the squirrels didn't seem to bother them much. They were about 150 yards from the woods, surrounded by open field, so maybe that made the difference?Gray squirrels will strip all of the fruit before it matures.
Thanks for the information! Donyave have both sweet and tart?I am terrible about taking pix when I should but we just harvested all of this yrs cherries. 5 1-gallon freezer bags. We have a few trees, some just 2-3 yrs old, one is 6-7 yrs old, the rest inbetween. The oldest had MANY cherries and we did beat the birds to most of them. We have Bing and Montmorect mostly, plus a black taritan (spelling?) Cherries were our only fruit to NOT get ZAPPED by the late frost in May. Check TY TY nursery, most of ours came from them. Pick based on your desired uses - cooking, canning, eating raw....