Black Cherry (Prunus Serotina)

Local Name: Black Cherry

Botanical Name: Prunus serotina

Family: Rosaceae

Native Status: Dakota County Native

Landscape Archetype: Prairie (as a successionist invader), Savanna, Woodland, Forest

Life Cycle: Legacy (80-100 years, rare individuals can live up to 200 years)

Sun Exposure: Full sun to shade

Soil Moisture: Mesic to Dry

Soil Type: Loam, Clay, Sand, Gravel

Height & Width Range: Height: Medium Canopy Tree (60-90 ft.)  Width: 20–40 ft at maturity

Bloom Color: White

Morphology Notes: A tall forest tree with a slender trunk and relatively small crown when it is growing in competition with other trees. The bark is smooth dark reddish brown when young, eventually turning grey and fissured with scales as it ages. The bark is highly ornamental and provides excellent texture in a closed canopy situation or when paired with contrasting leafy textures. Leaves are oval, finely serrated, glossy (glabrous) above, with a pale underside and have a gorgeous orange fall color. Spring flowers form in slender, drooping racemes of small white blooms. The fruit orients itself in those same clusters, forming red and maturing to black. This tree is prized by woodworkers for its strong tight grains and beautiful heartwood color. You can build a guitar neck or inlay a desk in 20 years if you plant it today.  

Fruits and Seeds: Fruits are glossy red to black drupes containing a single hard seed. They ripen mid‑ to late summer hence the botanical name, Serotina derived from the Latin serōtinus, meaning “happening late” or “cherry that comes late”. The cherries are loved by birds. Despite common misconceptions, the fruit is also edible to humans, but seeds contain Hydrogen cyanide. Do not break or chew the seeds because you can potentially release the cyanide into your system. One seed probably won’t kill you but eating them like fistfuls of almonds will surely make you sick. If you eat a seed whole it will likely pass through you with no problem as this is a design feature of this plant. Remember birds eat them whole every year and still somehow house cats are the biggest threat to their safety. Some trees have highly palatable fruit while others are gross. In urban and suburban yards, the fruit will be so high on the tree you’ll never get it, but in wide open sunny spaces the branches will be low to the ground giving you an advantage over the birds. Eat raw, cooked, juiced or jammed.

Habit and habitat: An upland forest tree scattered in oak‑maple forests, forest margins, edgelands, forgotten fields and fencerows where birds poop out the seeds. In our area along with Aspens (Populus spp.), cherries are one of the first trees to establish after disturbance or buckthorn removal. Thrives in well‑drained soils but tolerates a range of soils from sandy uplands to richer mesic forests. The root system is extensive but plays nice with underplanting’s.  Shade‑tolerant when young but won’t persist in deep shade. It grows best with canopy breaks or wide-open sun. If you live in the Twin Cities area you probably have this species on your property already so build a garden around it as this tree will easily outlive you with a life span of 80-200 years!

Companions: Partners in crime: Red Oak (Quercus rubra) or really any Oak species, Big‑tooth Aspen (Populus grandidentata), White Pine (Pinus strobus), American Hazelnut (Corylus americana), Gray Dogwood (Cornus racemosa), Chokecherry (Prunus virginiana), Nannyberry (Viburnum lentago), Serviceberry (Amelanchier arborea), Red‑berried Elder (Sambucus racemosa).

Friends to plant with a Prunus sapling: Silky Wild Rye (Elymus villosus), Woodland Sunflower (Helianthus strumosus), Wild Geranium (Geranium maculatum), Solomon’s Plume (Maianthemum racemosum), White Snakeroot (Ageratina altissima), Zigzag Goldenrod (Solidago flexicaulis), Brown Eye Susan (Rudbeckia triloba), Late Figwort (Scrophularia marilandica), Sweet Joe Pye Weed (Eutrochium purpureum), Giant Purple Hyssop (Agastache scrophulariifolia).

Additions to add under a mature specimen:  Bottlebrush Grass (Elymus hystrix), Woodland sedges/Carex species like C. Sprengellii or C. Rosea, C. eburnea, Woodland asters like Symphyotrichum lateriflorum or S. cordifolium, Actaea spp., Smooth Solomon’s Seal (Polygonatum biflorum), Sweet Cicely (Osmorhiza claytonii), Early Figwort (Scrophularia lanceolata).

Ecological Associations: Black Cherry is a quintessential wildlife tree. Its flowers attract a wide range of mining bees (Andrena spp.), sweat bees (Lasioglossum spp.), small carpenter bees (Ceratina spp.), and numerous syrphid flies. The leaves host larvae of hundreds of caterpillars including Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus), Eastern Tent Caterpillar (Malacosoma americanum) and a variety of leafroller moths. The foliage also supports generalist geometrid and noctuid caterpillars that define the base diet for woodland birds in the nest. The fruit is heavily used by Gray Catbird (Dumetella carolinensis), American Robin (Turdus migratorius), Cedar Waxwing (Bombycilla cedrorum), and many thrushes, which disperse the seeds widely. Bark and wood tissues support boring beetles as well as fungi like the Black Knot Fungus (Apiosporina morbosa), a common pathogen of Prunus species that creates the lumpy “burl‑like” growths seen on trunks and branches. You can’t walk through a forest without seeing one of these bulges or black cankers on the stems. If your tree gets this you can consult an arborist, but these trees are tough and will live unaffected for decades.  

Provenance: Dakota County

NH Propagation Technique: Seed

Special Powers: Your relationship with this tree will be like that movie, She’s All That, from 1999. A popular person like yourself makes a bet with your neighborhood that you can turn an overlooked tree into a garden centerpiece. You choose Black Cherry (Prunus serotina), a quiet, underappreciated plant that secretly kicks ass. But as your scheme unfolds you get to know Black Cherry in a deeper way, the makeover you planned becomes secondary to your developing relationship. When the truth about the bet comes out, both you and Black Cherry have to decide who you really are and what you actually want. Stay together? Or let your neighbors' opinion dictate your yard? Don’t be the one left standing naked at graduation. Regardless, Black Cherry is a four-season queen. She looks beautiful young and old, in sickness and in health. She performs indispensable ecosystem services throughout her entire lifespan as a true keystone species—she really is all that and a bag of chips.