You say semi dwarf, what rootstock would that mean? Cherries take a long time to bear on some roots. But 6 years is a long time even for a cherry on mazzard.

Are there any spurs forming on the trees? Are these sweet cherries?

Fruit trees generally don't need much fertilizer. If they are green and big enough to suit your needs, don't fret about fertilizer. If light green and not growing enough apply some nitrogen.

some are bing & 2 are a yellow cherry but all are sweet.
2 of these trees have barely grown at all. that's why im considering fertilizer. i have some 13-13-13 in the shed. i'll give them a light dose of that. the soil is mostly clay but i did give the roots a good mix of loam & manure when they were planted. i'm not sure of the rootstock. these all all came from lowes. if they do the same next year i might yank them & replace them with pears, apples, or peaches. i'm 62 & would like to harvest some fruit before i croak.

Robert49: Have to tell our funny story... we (senior citizens also) bought a' 4-in-1 apple tree from one of those mail order catalog nurserys; no indication any where where the different varieties were grafted! Eight years later not a single flower or fruit had ever appeared - yet the nursery says 'it takes time'! Well, tired of watering the fruitless tree we decided last Fall to cut it down... : there laying on the ground was the discarded infertile apple tree... with TWO apples on it!

Bing needs pollination. Not any sweet cherry could cross pollinate Bing. Do you know what varieties are your yellow ones? If you bought all from Lowe's. I don't know how actually their labels are, either.

It seems Bing is not easy to grow fruitfully outside the West Coast. My friend who also lives in MA planted Bing 5 years ago. It's sold at Lowe's here so she thought it'd be good here. She did not know that it needs pollination and that it's not a cherry tree for the East Coast.

Now that she knows Stella (sweet cherry) can cross pollinate Bing. She will buy a Stella next year. She does not want to cut it down. It's about 12 ft tall now.

Your problem could be that you plant sweet cherry varieties that are not compatible re. pollination.

It took 6 years until my starkrimson sweet cherry bloomed and the semi dawrf Bing from Lowes took 6 years to bloom (this year) and only had a few blooms although if like the starkrimson tree i will expect a full tree of blooms next year.

The blooms is the easy part, getting fruit to harvest before birds, squirrels, disease, weather, etc. is the hard part.

i'll do some checking but the labels are long gone. i do know that at least 2 were bings & there is a stella in the mix somewhere. what varieties would y'all recommend for the midwest?
& i know about the critters. mepps fishing lure company buys squirrel tales to make lures. they pay double if you take your pay in trade ( lures ) since i'm keeping tails i have an accurate head ( tail ) count. between my live traps & pellet rifle i on average kill 350 squirrels a year & 15-20 skunks. the skunks tap on my hives & eat the bees when they come out.

If you definitely has 1-2 Bing and a Stella, you'll solve cross pollination issue. Maybe, you need to wait one or two more years for the trees to mature for fruit production due to the rootstocks they are on.

My friend's semi-dwarf Bing from Lowe's only took 3 yrs to bloom.

Midwest esp. Michigan is known for sour cherry. You could try the Hungarian varieties which are supposed to be sweet enough to eat out of hand. Less issues with sour cherry.

If you really want sweet cherry, White Gold and Black Gold are often mentioned as sweet cherry to grow outside the West Coast. They are self fertile so you only need one.

Once your cherry produces, you'll be worried about birds, rain, cracking, rotting, etc, on top of everything else. Just be ready.

I know this is an old post but I will comment anyway. I also live in St. Louis and have a dwarf Bing Cherry tree purchased from Home Depot. I don't know what the rootstock is but it is definitely grafted. I would guess it is at least 5 to 6 years old. It was labeled as a dwarf but it is huge (somehow I don't think it's an actual dwarf). I received a few blooms this year but saw no fruit. There are several pollinators next door (sour and sweet cherry trees) and my neighbor is a beekeeper. The next door neighbor planted a dwarf Bing the year after I planted mine and this year she got blooms and cherries. Go figure!!!

Have you been pruning?

Bing is picky re. pollination. Although there may be several other cherry trees around but if those are not pollen compatible with Bing, they are useless.

If you buy fruit trees from Lowe's or Home Depot, they call label semi-dwarf or dwarf but if you don't know a rootstock, it does not mean anything.

If your trees are on Krymsk 1 or Gisela 5, they are legitimately dwarf. Again, dwarf cherry tree can top off at 15 ft. Considering a full grown cherry trees can go up 30-40 ft. A 12-14 ft cherry tree is a dwarf.

My sweet cherry trees fruit in 3 yrs. Several sweet cherry esp. new varieties are self fertile. You only need one tree.

these trees are now 7 years old. one has barely grown. because of saturated ground this spring one of the bigger trees fell over. I could have propped it back up but instead I let it die. in seven years I've seen about 20 blossoms & 6 cherries. these trees are kindling. I might try 2 new cherry trees from a nursery. i've heard not all cherry trees do well in this area. there's a starks about an hour from here. they should stock something that will do well here. the other 4 trees will replaced by apples & pears. as far as pollination these trees are within 25' of 12 bee hives. on another note it was looking like I'd be having a bumper crop of peaches. the trees so laden I was planning building props to hold up the limbs. well with record spring rains all the trees came down with brown rot. I did not get 1 friggin' peach.

If you soil tends to be soggy, you should build mounds or berms to plant your trees. Most fruit trees esp. stone fruit do not like wet feet.

If you don't spray, it's hard to get good stone fruit (peach, cherry, plum). Monterey Fungi Fighter is a good spray against brown rot. Peach has a lot more issues than just brown rot, though.

the trees are on a slight slope which usually has good drainage. we had record breaking rains this spring, hence the saturated ground. can the fungicide be sprayed when the trees are dormant?

The fungicide used at dormant usually is copper. The popular one is Kocide. It is for a lot of things but is not effective for brown rot when you spray at dormant.

east meets west- what other issues? I have 14 bee hives within 8'-40' of these trees. last year the almond growers in California sprayed their trees with a fungicide labeled safe for bees while commercial pollinators hade their hives there. it did not kill the bees outright but when carried back to the hives it killed off the brood ( eggs & larva ) which killed the hives. I suppose that if the trees are not blooming the bees would not be working the trees so I could spray them at night after tarping over the hives. i'll have to do some research. i'll give up the trees before i'' give up the bees.

1. Are you talking aboutyour Bing cherry? Is so, it is because the other cheeprry trees are not pollen compatible with Bing. Your stella is self fertile and should fruit by now.
2. where did you buy your Stella from? How certain you are that the tree was not mislabelled. It happens a lot if you buy it from Home Depot or Lowe or not a reputable nursery on line.
3. google Scott Smith plus growing fruit. His new website will showup. Houzz does not want us to put the link here. That forum is where experienced backyard fruit growers congregate. You will get more answers there.

Stella is supposed to be compatible to Bing. I lean toward a mislabelled trees or late frost killing flower buds.

hey rober49 did anything change with your cherry trees ? i plant one Ultra Dwarf Self Fertile Bing Cherry 3 years ago in ma small garden here in Southern California. I never seen a single flower on that tree and no fruits for obvious reason. This tree grown a lot in past tree years and i would say with trimming its around 7-8 feet tall but was easy 10-12 feet. Each warm season has lots of leaves but never flowers. i notice same thing with my orange tree and goose berries.. is it possible that mine soil is just bad. My neighbors have Fig and apricot tree that gives a lot of fruits every year. we all i believe have same soil..

i live in San Diego and for past few years the lowest temp we recorded in winter was around 45F so definitely no chill hours in here.. Whats interesting not even my orange tree gives fruits.. i bought my small dwarf orange tree 4 years ago, first year when i get it has 2 oranges, 2nd year year 1 orange and where way smaller. then no fruits since then. even at this time of the year i see my neighbors orange tree start slowly blooming but not mine. I forget to mention that i also bought Honey Crisp tree 3 years ago and ever since have maybe 5-6 leaves on it but no flowers and no fruits.. its not even growing much tbh.. i kind of feel like get rid of cherry and apple tree and just give up..