Skeena®

A late season self-fertile dark red cherry from Canada, with a well-balanced sweet-sharp cherry flavour

Skeena ripens later than most cherries, and is good choice for extending the sweet cherry season into early August. The fruit is also larger than most cherry varieties.

Growing and Training

Skeena was developed for commercial growers, so it is easy to manage and fruits heavily from a young age.

Skeena is a bit susceptible to fruit-cracking and brown rot - the two often go hand in hand, and are caused by rain at harvest time. Whilst this has limited its appeal to commercial growers, it is unlikely to be an issue for the gardener or community orchard.

History

Skeena was developed at the Summerland research station in British Columbia, Canada, during the 1990s, and released to commercial growers in 2005. The immediate parents were two unnamed research varieties, but Skeena is descended from Stella, Van, and Bing, and is very similar in flavour to Sunburst (which has a similar parentage).

Skeena characteristics

• Gardening skillExperienced
• Fruit persistenceNormal ripening
• Self-fertile?Self-fertile
• Pollinating othersAverage
• Pick seasonLate
• Picking periodearly August
• Keeping1-3 days
• Food usesEating fresh
• Country of originCanada
• Period of origin2000
• Fruit colourRed

You might also like these varieties

• 
  Lapins
  A popular red mid-season cherry which is easy to grow. Self-fertile.
• 
  Stella
  Stella is perhaps the most popular mid-season red-cherry. Self-fertile and a good pollinator for other cherries.
• 
  Sunburst
  A large red mid-season cherry with a good sweet mild flavour. Self-fertile.
• 
  Sweetheart
  One of the best-flavoured late-season cherries for the UK climate. Self-fertile.

More about cherry trees

Sweet cherries are easy to grow as long as you have a sunny sheltered spot. The main challenge is to keep the birds off - use a net or horticultural fleece to cover the tree or at least some of the branches in late spring.

If you only have space for one cherry tree make sure it is a self-fertile one. We highlight these on our website - look for Stella, Sweetheart, Sunburst, or Lapins.Self-fertile cherry trees are also good pollinators for the more traditional English cherry varieties.

Sweet cherries are often categorised by colour. Red cherries have red or skins and light red flesh, and nearly all the self-fertile cherries are in this category. So-called 'white' cherries usually have pale red or pink or white skins and pale flesh. So-called 'black' cherries usually have dark red or black skins.

Sweet cherries are also categorised by their picking season. Early season equates to mid / late June in southern England. Mid-season is late June / early July. Late-season is mid-July onwards.