CHOKE CHERRIES

     Choke cherry trees are small, and favor rich, moist soil and a limestone bedding, all of which are prevalent here in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, as well as across much of northern North America. They are trees of rural roadsides, and thickets between fields and along woodland edges.  They are shade tolerant and flourish in the shade of larger trees in those thickets.

     In April, as leaves grow on choke cherry twigs, one or more broods of tent caterpillars, which are the larvae of a small moth, hatch on many choke cherry trees.  Each group of siblings creates a protective, silvery web in a crotch of twigs where they live by day in relative safety.  However, two species of American cuckoos pull many caterpillars from their webs to devour them, fuzz and all.  

     Every night, except in rainy weather, surviving larvae emerge from their web homes to consume choke cherry foliage.  They lay down trails of webbing along twigs and limbs so they can find their way back to their nests.  Toward the end of May, the caterpillars leave their web homes and pupate in the soil.  Later they emerge as small moths ready to find mates and lay eggs for the next generation of tent caterpillars.

     Pretty choke cherry flowers begin to bloom around mid-May.  Those lovely blossoms are white, small and grow in long, drooping clusters from the tips of twigs.  A variety of native bees sip nectar from them, and pollinate them.  Hanging clusters of green drupes form where the flowers were and become up to a half-inch across and purple-red-ripe by the end of July.  Those drupes are ingested by a variety of berry-eating birds and mammals.    

     Other kinds of wildlife consume various parts of choke cherries.  White-tailed deer and cottontail rabbits eat the buds and foliage they can reach.  And a variety of moth and butterfly larvae devour choke cherry foliage.  

     Choke cherry foliage turns orange-red in autumn, adding more beauty to farmland hedgerows, roadsides and woodland edges.  

     Choke cherry trees are not well-known, or popular to plant on lawns, but they are valuable to wildlife in cropland.  And they have certain beauties we humans can enjoy.   

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