Wild cherries or Bird cherries?

[scrogger]

Or are they pretty much the same.

Just got back in from walking the dogs and whilst wandering across the fields I have come across 6 trees laden with fruit that looks very much like a small cherry some dark red and some bright red also very juicy.

I have looked up bird cherries which appear to be smaller and more green on the google search I did. Can anyone enlighten me and perhaps come up with a few uses for said fruit.

I did Sloe gin and vodka last year in the Autumn which was a great success so i was wondering about cherry brandy or vodka.

Any thoughts folks? Also could they be eaten somehow rather than made into drinks.

 

[Joonsy]

i believe the bird cherry is a black fruit, though i'm not positive about it, there's been loads of red cherries here but no black ones, some trees have larger fruits and these seem a bit sweeter to me, most are quite small and a little bitter. In Roger Phillips book on wild flowers bird cherry is shown very dark looking like a black fruit.