Bark is grayish brown, smooth with conspicuous horizontal pores (lenticels), becoming dark gray to black with coarse scaly plates peeling upward around the edges, often described as resembling burnt potato chips. The trunk can typically get up to just over 24 inches in diameter at breast height.

Black Cherry (Prunus serotina) on the Heart Lake Trail (15 July 2018). Black Cherry bark is reddish-brown and smooth when young, with conspicuous, horizontal gray lines. The inner bark has a bitter almond smell. As the trees mature, the bark breaks into scales that are curled outward.

Prunus serotina flower cluster. For about its first decade the bark of a black cherry tree is thin, smooth, and banded, resembling a birch. A mature tree has very broken, dark gray to black bark.

The bark of a young wild cherry tree is a smooth, medium brown, with horizontal lenticles (raised pores in the stem of a woody plant), but grows rougher and darker as the tree matures. This tree is mature, as noted by the bark's reddish brown, rough, and lightly upturned plates.

The bark of mature trees develops a dark scaly or flaky pattern. Bark, roots, and leaves contain concentrations of toxic cyanogenic compounds, hence the noticeable bitter almond aroma of the inner bark. Prunus serotina can be pruned and kept at shrub size by cutting them to the ground every 2-3 years.