Pears, anyone?

[deepsleep]

I notice we spend a lot more time on apples than pears here, but sometimes pears need a fair shake too. Here are 3 of mine from a few days ago. I have been super impressed by my pears. No disease (they are FB resistant varieties) or pest issues. We had a late frost which terminated most of my apple crop, but not the pears. I decided to do minimal pruning after reading on here, but I take one low branch of them yearly. I know some of you guys may be too cold for them, but they are as easy as fruit gets where I am. Tasty, too. Sorry the pictures aren't the best, but here goes.

Kieffer, unknown rootstock, potted, 5th leaf. Pic only shows about 1/3 of the tree




Shinko Asian Pear, OHxF97, 5th leaf



Olympic Asian Pear, OHxF97, 5th leaf



Unfortunately for the deer, they will be getting very few of them because I will be eating a ton of them! Who else has pear pics?

 

[greyphase]

In 2010 I planted some wild pears (pyrus communis) I had gotten from Fedco nursery. I limb grafted Keifer and Luscious on to them in 2014 and this year I was surprised to find two Keifer pear on one of the branches I had grafted.

I have a Staceyville pear that I planted in 2005. Five or six years ago a bear pushed it over and I gave it up for dead. I should have propped it up because it continued to grow and now produces pears, but from it's near horizontal position the deer clean if off before I can get any picked :(. Also have a Seckel pear that produced fruit last year but none this year.

 

[dipper]

I prefer a juicy pear over almost any Apple. I've got a long ways to go with mine since I just grafted them this spring.

 

[Turkey Creek]

Looking good!

 

[deepsleep]

Greyphase--Kieffers are very precocious and completely foolproof in my area. Your horizontal pear sound like it still feeds a few deer! I have 2nd or 3rd leaf Seckel coming along. Those little pears are delicious and supposedly FB resistant.

Dipper and Stu--I enjoy pears a lot myself. Seems people either love them or hate them. I've always loved Asian Pears, and these off the tree are unbelievable. We've kept them into the new year in the crisper and they stay crisp and juicy. Far juicier than any apple as a matter of fact. The one that surprised me was Kieffer. We picked those off the tree after they started falling and put them in the crisper for a few weeks and they were excellent. Crunchier than a Bartlett, but not really gritty. More the texture of an Asian Pear with European Pear flavor. I have heard people say they are only good for canning but the strain I got was great after some storage.

T.C. Thanks!

I know more of you guys have some great pear pics this fall--post em up.

Also, if anybody has any late hanging pears, let us know.

 

[deepsleep]

That's something I've tried to learn over the years as well. I believe a couple guys on the other site have some pears that hang into October, that would definitely be interesting. The Southworth pear I grafted this spring is supposed to ripen in late September in NY, I'm hoping that means some of them would still be hanging come October.

Oympic doesn't ripen until the middle of October. I'm not sure how they hang, I pick them all! Also, not hardy enough for you guys. I thought they were borderline for me but we have had back to back -24 or so, and they have had no dieback and great production. IIRC my Kieffer seems to drop near the end of October, over a short period of time. The pears seem to hold up very well on the ground until gone. I'm guessing you're too cold up there for Kieffer, but not positive. Surely, SLN had some hardy varieties for you guys to try?

 

[dipper]

Yup, u really start loosing variety once u get into zone 4.

 

[deepsleep]

Yes, they did. I believe Fedco does as well. A number of those SLN had (has?) can be had via GRIN. I don't think Kieffer would survive here long term, but I'm not sure.

I have one wild pear (seed came from either Geo or paleopoint on the other site) that is now about 8-9' tall. The second winter it died back to the top of the 5' tube, but then grew out of the tube again. I thought it had died back to the top of the tube again this spring, but the portion out of the tube just took longer to leaf out (like 10 days) than the portion inside the tube. I'm thinking if that tree can survive here, its just a matter of getting "lucky".

Maybe so, but I've read that some of these borderline trees can survive and even thrive if they can get through a few seasons. I find that here in Florida. We are technically too far north for Mango trees, but there are several around in people's yards growing and producing just fine. If you can get them to 3 or 4 years old, they do fine with frost, but younger than that, frost kills them. We get as many as 3 "hard" frosts (say 28 degrees for a few hours) here per winter, but the past 2 we've had none. If you planted a Mango 2 years ago, you are home free. At my place in MI, I've planted several things that I think are borderline---Asian Pears, Dunstans, I.E. Mulberry, Oikos Persimmons, Prok and Yates persimmons. The last 2 years have been the coldest winters of my life up there, and yet the only thing that has had obvious dieback is a few Dunstans. I guess what I'm saying is, you never know until you try, a belief I know you share.

 

[deepsleep]

Yup, I've been a "zone stretcher" for a long time. I have found that the "window" is much narrower here than what I was used to on my old place (zone 5a, old 4b). I believe that within each variety there is variability in hardiness. Plant 20 Kieffers here and I'd bet at least several survive and produce fruit. When/if we get a truly brutal winter with -35 or lower temps (haven't come close since I've been here) then even an established borderline tree could be toast.

After the winter of '13-'14 I saw a number of apple trees that had to be 15 years old or more either die or suffer major winter damage. Its a crapshoot this far north(or further)

Hopefully, those winters were once in a generation, though. If they continue, I'm sure some of my plantings will succumb to natural selection as well, or at least not produce (persimmons in particular).

btw, you were the inspiration behind me trying persimmon. Did any of your old trees end up producing yet?

 

[chummer]

Yup, I've been a "zone stretcher" for a long time. I have found that the "window" is much narrower here than what I was used to on my old place (zone 5a, old 4b). I believe that within each variety there is variability in hardiness. Plant 20 Kieffers here and I'd bet at least several survive and produce fruit. When/if we get a truly brutal winter with -35 or lower temps (haven't come close since I've been here) then even an established borderline tree could be toast.

After the winter of '13-'14 I saw a number of apple trees that had to be 15 years old or more either die or suffer major winter damage. Its a crapshoot this far north(or further)

I am also a zone stretcher but when they fail it sucks. I have posted on this tree before. It is an ayers pear that is rated for zone 5. I expected it to die so I stuck it in a place I didn't care if it made it or not. Well it has made it through the two worst winters possible and has had zero die back and is thriving. It has made it through a dozen or more -30+ days. This pic is from the spring but it has put on some nice growth this year and I am hoping for some blossoms next year.

 

[chummer]

^^^nothing ventured, nothing gained

Agreed. I was so sure it wouldn't make it I didn't even put a cage on it. I don't know why but it hasn't even had a leaf nipped. It certainly is a charmed tree.

 

[CrazyEd]

Where is the best place to buy a Kieffer on OHxF97 roots?

Grandpa's orchard?

 

[Turkey Creek]

I have some dandies available on OHXF87. ;) Some are probably pushing 6' tall in the nursery. Now that I think about might even have a couple 2 year olds in the nursery that I put on X97 last year.

 

[jaximus]

i have a couple pears on our hunting land. none have produced fruit yet, but i got them cheap, so its ok. ones a golden spice and the other is some more people friendly one. cant recall the name right now.

wallace woodstock nursery in neillsville, wi, is clearancing a bunch of stuff starting september 1, its unadvertised except if you get their flyer for having bought stuff from them. i guess they have a bunch of stuff left.
40% off dogwoods, 50% off blueberries/grapes/etc, 40% off crabapples, 40% off ornamental pears/plums. all are in pots and ready for pickup in neillsville only.

 

[CrazyEd]

I have some dandies available on OHXF87. ;) Some are probably pushing 6' tall in the nursery. Now that I think about might even have a couple 2 year olds in the nursery that I put on X97 last year.

Let me know if you have 97s forsale and for how much. I'll take 2 if you do.

 

[CrazyEd]

Order up a couple OHF97 rootstocks and get some Kieffer scions

Been there done that. My luck is awful with pears, I'm done trying.

 

[buckdeer1]

I cut down my producing trophy pears but Turkey Creek is going to fix me up for my next planting

 

[Turkey Creek]

Yup, I know. This was my first year having decent success with them. I've come to believe that unless your cuts are perfectly flat and of matching length on both rootstock and scion...your odds of success are slim.

Cleft grafts seem to work best for me.

I will check and get back to CrazyEd.

 

[Turkey Creek]

I'm always wary of cleft grafts, I worry about long term strength of the graft union. May be an unfounded fear on my part

I have yet to have a graft fail of any type once the tree has shown substantial growth. My trees are routinely subjected to 30+ mph winds. A year ago fathers day we had 90 mph straight line winds, never had a scion break loose (except one bark grafted scion that already had 20" of more of growth and was not supported), but lost plenty of tops out of older trees. Not saying that my trees or anybodys trees are bullet proof, just that graft unions as a result of the grafting type are rarely an issue. Graft incompatibility between scions and rootstock types is a different issue.

 

[Turkey Creek]

As I mentioned to CrazyEd I think rootstock is an issue a lot of times with pears. As Mr Cummins indicated withe the "Dipper" incident of 2015:D, they are propagated differently and to some extent they behave differently. I know alot of pears are T-budded by the commercial growers in the fall after the rootstock has become established. However I do prefer to benchgraft because of time constraints in the fall and the ease of benchgrafting. Here are some Kieffers I grafted.

Two year old tree with feathers.



Kieffer bench grafted in late April



Diameter of that same April grafted tree. Cleft graft.