@TheFluffyBunny,
Would you by chance know what HW604 is? The list below I’m familiar with
HARROW SWEET™ (formerly HW-609)
AC Harrow Crisp™ (formerly HW 610)
AC Harrow Gold™ (formerly HW 616)
Harovin Sundown™ (formerly HW 614)
I found a few references to it, but don’t know if it ever got a name.
http://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2015/aac-aafc/agrhist/A51-1-1978.pdf
It refers to HW604 on page 101:
Breeding. Two fire-blight-resistant pear
selections, HW604 and HW605, were advanced
to station and grower trials. HW604
is an early-ripening selection for the early
fresh market, and HW605 is a late-ripening
pear with good storage life for the winter
market. Inheritance of fire blight resistance
was found to be polygenic with 42% of the
total phenotypic variation due to additive
gene action. It was also demonstrated that it
is possible to predict resistance of mature
field-grown pear seedlings on the basis of
tests conducted in the greenhouse on young
seedlings 6 mo after germination.
Bob Purvis has wood for it and describes it as follows:
Harrow 604: Somewhat spreading growth habit, well spurred, low vigor, very precocious, early ripening, fire blight resistant, hardy in Zone 4 but injured at -33F. Fruit has long neck, yellow, size small to medium, outstanding flavor, ripe early August in SW MN
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Thanks Bob I couldn’t find any information about HW604. I put in an order with Bob Purvis today and included that pear.
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Hopefully 616 and 614 will be available next year.
616 (Harrow Gold) is already available from Cummins:
ACTM Harrow Gold (formerly HW 616). Parentage: Harvest Queen x Harrow Delight. Fruit are picked about 10 days before Bartlett, between Harrow Delight and Harvest Queen. An attractive yellow fruit, with good size (larger than Harvest Queen, similar in size to Bartlett), smooth skin, fine texture, very good flavour with a good balance between sweetness and acidity, and exceptionally juicy. The fresh fruit quality of ACTM Harrow Gold is rated similar to Bartlett. As with many other early season pears, the fruit will not store for very long (probably no more than 4-6 weeks) in common cold storage, but it is excellent for roadside stands. This cultivar has received good to very good processing ratings and has been included in the CanAdapt pear trial. ACTM Harrow Gold has excellent resistance to natural fire blight infections (9.6 rating); however, in some years following inoculation with the causative organism, lesions have developed which have extended to about 25% of current season’s growth. Precocity in a second test planting appears to be similar to that of Bartlett. ACTM Harrow Gold is protected under the Plant Breeders Rights Act (application number 00-2185).
It looks like 614 (Harovin Sundown) is being sold as “Cold Snap”, but I don’t know if the trees are available in the US.
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Thanks Bob I like everything I read about those pears. Those pears may be to pears what the romance series is to cherries. It demonstrates some skillful breeding seldom seen nowadays.
I was just looking at the pears from Cummins again. They’ve got a lot more than at the start of the winter and I noticed that they are selling “Cold Snap TM”. Paragon also looks like an interesting pear.
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Beurre Superfin is said by many to be the highest quality of pears. It sounds similar to clapps favorite in terms of rotting on the tree if left a second to long. It’s on my list of pears for future grafting but may wind up being a next year thing.
I was not super impressed with what I got off my own superfin tree this year. Most were picked too late but I got a few on time and they were nothing special. But, I will give the tree a few more years to prove itself.
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Scott,
I will follow up with you after this year and see if they redeemed themselves before I graft some of them. Thanks
Scott,
Seen any fireblight on the Superfin?
Bob,
Did you try any of the new Harrow selections? Curious if you did and could tell us anything about their growth habits?
I guess this thread is a good place for this question. I have a Honeysweet pear that is 2 or 3 years old that I want to graft 2 additional varieties onto. This tree is stand alone in my little nephews grandfathers yard. So pollination is limited to this one 3x tree. I have access to Harvest Queen and Aurora, but happy to chase down anything else form forums members.
Harvest Queen is the best disease-resistant early-season pear.
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I have 4 years old HS that has fruited for the past 3 years, profusely this year without any E pear anywhere near my yard. I do have a few A pears that flower at the same time. They corss pollinate HS.
For that single HS you mentioned, I would graft Harrow Delight and Harvest Queen on it. That’s just me.
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Honesweet is self pollinating, These are the pear pollination partners for harvest queen http://www.orangepippintrees.com/pollinationchecker.aspx?v=4173. Aurora I don’t know a lot about because I don’t grow that one.
Clark,
Should have remembered that 
thanks.
The tree cckw mentioned should flower and fruit by next year…
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The literature suggests that only self-pollinating varieties are consistently self-fruitful but I believe that various pear varieties produce parthenocarpic fruit more than the literature recognizes. Otherwise, why have Bartlett pears historically been produced commercially in S. CA without pollinators although not self fertile? I have read of southern growers getting consistent crops of many varieties of pears not known to be self fertile without cross pollination. I’m guessing that warm springs with ideal conditions for harvesting sunlight encourage trees to hold onto unfertilized fruit. Pretty much every spring in S. CA is like that.
Just saying- not recommending growing pears without a pollinator. Why would you when they are so easy to graft and there is such a wide range of harvest time and fruit quality.
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Would anyone be willing to post a few pictures of the harrow pears this year? Would love to see them and mine are to young to fruit. Harrow delight and harrow sweet I’m particularly interested in. When do they get ripe? Anyone know when harvest queen is ripe?
