I had to throw all my Evans sour cherries because every last one was infested with curculio larvae. That tree is marked for removal...

What kind of pitter do you use, spartan?

"every last one was infested with curculio larvae. That tree is marked for removal..."

Because of curculio? They'll just move on to something else.
It's just like my Northstar was ignored by curculio until I sprayed my apples and then every cherry was hit.

I don't bother netting my Northstar. By the time the birds are eating them I'm ready to eat them. It's not like sweets where the birds will take them when they're green and hard.

Tilton:

I have a NorPRo that clamps onto my breadboard. It is a plunger type that pits one cherry at a time. I am very happy with the results but unhappy that I cannot get replacement gaskets for it. The unit comes with 2 gaskets.
One got thrown away by accident after washing (they are orange and look like the plastic clip fasteners found on
bags of store-bought bread). They are a soft rubber and
prevent the cherry from falling thru the hole as the pit is
plunged out.

The unit does make a mess as the cherry juice splats on my
kitchen counter (wife is not happy!). She threatens to have me do it outside on the picnic table if I don't clean up well afterwards.

Perhaps there are better units for sale, but I am happy with it and have pitted a lot of cherries over the last 8 years from my North Star. In 2011, I got 28 quarts off my
tree (measured after pitting).

I would LOVE to find one of the old fashioned farm style
pitters that have the flywheel to crank. Perhaps some day
I will find one at an auction. A friend has one from their
old farmstead that must be 100 years old and still works good! Made of metal. My NOrPro is plastic.

Frank:

I sprayed my North Star at petal fall with Imidan and then
used Imidan again on the second spraying. Since Imidan has
a 15 day clearance on stone fruits, I stop after the first two sprays.

Just when the fruit shows the first sign of pink I spray with Malathion and then net the tree the following day.

No curculo issues on my fruit. Imidan did the job again and did it well.

I wish my peaches were as good. Despite using Imidan, I got hit hard with curculio damage on 2 of my three peach
trees. Perhaps I should blame it on the well. The water
is coming up murky and full of sediment. I could not figure out why my sprayer was plugging up so much until I ran water into several buckets last time at my orchard.
The water was just full of crud. Never had a problem before with the water quality. I think the poor spray pattern I was getting may be part of the issue on the curculio damage on my peaches.

spartan - this one?

I got the Leifheit pitter that seems to be essentially the same as the one you describe. But if I were just doing jam, I'd have gotten the other.

Here is a link that might be useful: cherry stoner

I second the idea of pitting them when chilled. Not only less juice flows out, but they also don't get as mashed.

Alas, none to pit this year in Michigan, but have a pie for us, please!

"but unhappy that I cannot get replacement gaskets for it."

Mine only came with one gasket and it didn't last long.

I made a bunch for mine. I'm a jeweler with a vulcanizer for mold making. I vulcanized a sheet of the mold rubber to the correct thickness and cut gaskets out of it using my old one as a pattern.
These are lasting much longer.
Not exactly food grade but I doubt if much bad can come of it.

A vulcanizer is specialized equipment, especially now with pourable RTV molds but it may be worth checking around at jewelers that do custom design/casting.

iirc, the Leifheit company offers replacement gaskets.

Sometimes we us a chopstick as a pitter. It works well. We bought a pitter at bed bath and beyond. It also works well. No replacement parts.

Northstar is yummy but we get bacterial disease bad on it here.
John S
PDX OR