Overview

Bring the joy of fresh, homegrown fruit to your garden with the Royal Lee Cherry Tree. This vigorous and highly productive variety is celebrated for its delicious, heart-shaped fruit and early-season ripening, making it a favorite among cherry enthusiasts. Our Royal Lee Cherry Tree is a live, grafted plant, typically arriving 3 to 4 feet tall and shipped in a 3-gallon pot, ensuring a strong start in your landscape. Grafting ensures that you receive a tree with the desirable fruiting characteristics of the ‘Royal Lee’ cultivar, known for its consistent yields and superior taste. This beautiful deciduous tree will not only provide a bounty of fruit but also add ornamental value to your property with its seasonal blooms and lush foliage. Experience the satisfaction of picking sweet, juicy cherries right from your backyard.

Key Benefits

Investing in a Royal Lee Cherry Tree offers numerous rewards for the home gardener. Its remarkable characteristics make it a standout choice for fruit production and garden aesthetics:

• Exceptional Fruit Quality: The ‘Royal Lee’ cherry is renowned for its heart-shaped fruit, which boasts a delightful sweetness and rich flavor, perfect for fresh eating, baking, or preserves. You’ll enjoy a superior taste experience compared to store-bought varieties.
• Early Season Harvest: One of the most significant advantages of this variety is its early ripening period. You can look forward to enjoying fresh cherries earlier in the season, extending your harvest window. This also makes it a great choice for areas with shorter growing seasons.
• High Productivity: This grafted cherry tree is known for its impressive yields. With proper care, you can expect a generous abundance of fruit, providing plenty for your family and perhaps even some to share. Its consistent bearing habit ensures a reliable crop year after year.
• Grafted for Success: Our trees are expertly grafted, which means they are grown on a sturdy rootstock that promotes better disease resistance, vigor, and faster fruiting. This method ensures that the tree you receive will produce true-to-type ‘Royal Lee’ cherries.
• Beautiful Ornamental Value: Beyond its delicious fruit, the Royal Lee Cherry Tree is an attractive addition to any garden. It features lovely white blossoms in spring, followed by vibrant green foliage, and finally, the striking red fruit, making it a focal point in your landscape.
• Pollination Benefits: While ‘Royal Lee’ is an excellent producer, it often benefits from a compatible pollinator for maximized fruit set, such as a ‘Minnie Royal’ cherry tree. This can lead to even larger and more consistent harvests, making it a smart choice for those looking to expand their orchard.
• Supports Local Wildlife: The flowers provide nectar for pollinators like bees, and the fruit, if not entirely harvested, can be a welcome treat for local birds, contributing to the biodiversity of your garden ecosystem.

Plant Care & Growing Tips

Caring for your Royal Lee Cherry Tree will ensure a bountiful harvest for years to come. These trees thrive with thoughtful attention to their environmental needs. When it comes to sunlight, cherry trees, especially fruit-bearing varieties, require at least 6-8 hours of direct sunlight daily to produce the best fruit. Choose a location in your garden that receives full sun exposure throughout the day. Well-draining soil is crucial for the health of your grafted cherry tree. A loamy soil with a pH between 6.0 and 7.0 is ideal. Avoid heavy clay soils that retain too much moisture, as this can lead to root rot. If your soil is heavy, amend it with organic matter like compost to improve drainage.

Watering is particularly important during the tree’s establishment phase and dry spells. Young trees need consistent moisture; water deeply 1-2 times per week, ensuring the soil is moist but not waterlogged. Once established, cherry trees are moderately drought-tolerant but will benefit from supplemental watering during extended dry periods, especially when fruit is developing. Fertilize your Royal Lee Cherry Tree in early spring with a balanced slow-release fertilizer designed for fruit trees. Follow the product instructions for application rates to avoid over-fertilization. Pruning is best done in late winter or early spring while the tree is dormant. Focus on removing dead, diseased, or crossing branches, and thin out the canopy to improve air circulation and light penetration, which helps with fruit production. This also helps to maintain the tree’s shape and manage its size.

The ‘Royal Lee’ cherry typically performs well in USDA Hardiness Zones 7-10. It requires a certain number of chill hours to set fruit, so it’s best suited for climates with mild winters. Protect young trees from extreme cold snaps by wrapping the trunk or covering the plant. Common pests include aphids and cherry fruit flies, while diseases like brown rot can affect fruit. Regular inspection and appropriate organic or conventional treatments can keep these issues in check. Understanding how to grow cherry tree successfully involves these key practices, ensuring a healthy and productive plant.

Size & Details

This offering is for one Royal Lee Cherry Tree, a live plant that arrives ready for planting. Each tree is typically 3 to 4 feet tall from the base of the root ball to the top of the plant, providing a substantial specimen that is well on its way to maturity. It is shipped in a 3-gallon nursery pot, which provides ample room for the root system to develop during transit and allows for easy transplanting into your garden or a larger container. Being a grafted tree, it benefits from the characteristics of both the scion (the ‘Royal Lee’ variety) and the rootstock, often resulting in quicker fruiting and improved disease resistance. With proper care, this early season cherry tree can grow to a mature height of 10-15 feet in a home garden setting, with a similar spread, making it a manageable size for many landscapes. Expect the first significant fruit production within 2-4 years after planting, with yields increasing as the tree matures.

Frequently Asked Questions

• Q: How big does this Royal Lee Cherry Tree get? A: This Royal Lee Cherry Tree typically arrives 3 to 4 feet tall. At maturity, with proper care and pruning, it can reach a height of 10-15 feet with a similar spread in a home garden setting.
• Q: What size pot does it come in? A: The grafted cherry tree is shipped in a 3-gallon nursery pot, providing a healthy root system for successful transplanting into your garden or a larger container.
• Q: Is this an indoor or outdoor plant? A: The Royal Lee Cherry Tree is an outdoor fruit tree. It requires full sun exposure and is best suited for planting directly in the ground in appropriate USDA Hardiness Zones.
• Q: How much sunlight does it need? A: For optimal growth and fruit production, this early season cherry tree needs at least 6-8 hours of direct sunlight per day. Choose a sunny spot in your garden.
• Q: Is this plant easy to care for? A: While not entirely hands-off, the Royal Lee Cherry Tree is considered moderately easy to care for, especially for gardeners with some experience. Consistent watering, proper pruning, and fertilization are key to success.
• Q: What condition will it arrive in? A: You will receive one healthy, live Royal Lee Cherry Tree with good roots, shipped securely in its 3-gallon pot to ensure it arrives in the best possible condition for planting.
• Q: When is the best time to plant a cherry tree? A: The best time to plant a Royal Lee Cherry Tree is typically in early spring or fall, allowing the tree to establish its root system before extreme summer heat or winter cold.
• Q: Will it survive winter in my zone? A: The ‘Royal Lee’ cherry tree is generally hardy in USDA Zones 7-10. If you are in a colder zone, you may need to provide winter protection or consider growing it in a large container that can be moved indoors.
• Q: Does this tree need a pollinator? A: For maximum fruit production, the Royal Lee Cherry Tree often benefits from a compatible pollinator, such as a ‘Minnie Royal’ cherry tree. While it can produce some fruit on its own, cross-pollination significantly increases yields.
• Q: How long until it produces fruit? A: With proper care, you can typically expect your Royal Lee Cherry Tree to begin producing a significant harvest within 2-4 years after planting. Fruit production will increase as the tree matures.