The First Cherry Harvest

It Took So Long

The weather in the Netherlands is finally showing its good side, and for us, that means being outside as much as possible and enjoying the weather as much as possible. Before we know it, summer will be over. However, I don't want to think about that right now. Due to the bad weather recently, a lot in our vegetable garden is not going according to plan, and the peppers and paprikas, for example, currently look like they will not produce a harvest at all. Those aren't fun things if you've put a lot of effort into them... but unfortunately, it's life. We will have to deal with it and enjoy what went well even more.

Securing Harvest

Anyone who has cherry trees in their garden is undoubtedly aware of the fact that birds also love cherries. Last year our young cherry trees had quite a few cherries for the first time, so that could only get better this year. What we learned from the previous year was that we didn't have any cherries left once they started to ripen. Birds watch to see whether a cherry is ripe or not yet. They start pecking much earlier. So that meant that last year we no longer had cherries to harvest, the birds were grateful to us, but we were a bit disappointed. This year we did it differently. From the moment the first blossoms appeared on our cherry tree, we were ready to make sure we could enjoy the cherries ourselves this year. Of course, you have to wait to let nature do its work, so bees have to get to our trees. The pollination had to happen. And when we saw almost no flowers anymore, but only the beginnings of small cherries, then it was time to get our mosquito net out of the cupboard. Hopefully, that would protect our cherries. It was an experiment, but that experiment worked great.

Fortunately, no bird ever got stuck in the net. We often had a bunch of cheeky little birds sitting on the net, pecking in frustration in an attempt to get our cherries. But our mosquito net held up and our cherries stayed safe.

Sunday: Perfect Weather and Ripe Cherries

On Sunday the time had finally come. After each picking a cherry, we decided that they were ripe, and it was time to harvest our cherries. The cherries were sweet and juicy, just what you would hope a cherry would taste like. It was time to take the net off completely and start picking. While my partner was busy in the sun doing some wood carving, I spent half an hour picking and ended up with a beautiful bowl full of sweet, juicy red cherry happiness. They are still small, but our tree is still small and will never grow much bigger, because it is not in the open ground but in a container. It is, so to speak, a very large bonsai tree. Still, this doesn't spoil my fun at all, there is nothing better than eating home-grown fruit.

Share with the Birds

Now I have to admit that I'm not the greediest person in the world. And I love the birds in our garden. To ensure that they stay, I am also willing to share my harvest with them. So while picking the cherries I decided that I wouldn't pick the entire tree. I would leave some cherries hanging for the birds. It's just fun to watch those creatures at work, and it's something I can watch for hours on the days I'm outside with Skipper. Of course, I also try to capture it on camera. Sometimes that works better than other times, but hey, that is also the sport of photography. It keeps you busy, it keeps you focused and it gives you purpose when you sit outside enjoying your garden, the little nature that is left, and the few things that are still free these days.

I think the birds are grateful to me. They looked at our cherries in frustration for weeks, but they couldn't do anything with them. And now they could finally go about their business. And believe me, they are doing that. Even if I'm only 2 meters from the tree, they just fly into the tree, peck at the cherries, and fly away again. They look at me and decide I'm not doing anything, and they come closer and closer. It's a celebration for them and me.

Future Harvests

We are already looking forward to future harvests. With what we learned this year, we hope our cherries will be bigger and even sweeter. But even if it isn't, we know we've found a great system. The mosquito net ensures that we have our harvest and that we decide which part goes to the birds.

And so our garden is increasingly becoming a place to relax, but also a place where life grows and where nature is shared.

We look forward to many summers filled with sweet cherries, chattering birds, and the simple pleasure of gardening. At the end of the day, it's not just the harvest that counts, but the journey to get there and the joy we find along the way. We are not farmers who do it to earn as much as possible, we are just people who enjoy growing as much as possible to eat as healthily as possible.