I’m looking to add one more pear to my orchard and am trying to find something that tastes great and has really good resistance to fireblight. Anyone have any suggestions for a grower in 7B?
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Mickster,
I’m a pear collector and just noticed your question with no answers. I have grown pears in the humid southeast where fireblight destroys most pear trees quickly. Now I live in a more congenial spot - Sebastopol, CA (home of Luther Burbank’s experimental farm). That said, we have an occasional year with rampant fireblight. I’m an active member of the CRFG Redwood Empire chapter and have written a couple of things about pears with fireblight resistance. Here are the links:
If you let me know what varieties you have, I can make specific recommendations but my first choice would be Warren or scions from my Not Moonglow that I think is Warren,
David
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I am interested in this subject as well. I may be grafting as many as 20 varieties next spring onto one tree that I am espaliering. My other concern is: How can I verify that the scion stock is virus free so I don’t infect the entire tree?
Thanks for posting. I enjoyed reading about the different fireblight resistance.
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I also live in 7b and I’m looking to add a pear. I’ve considered several of the ones you wrote about. Thankyou taking the time to write this up and make that recommendation. I’ll be looking for Warren scionwood this winter.
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I’m in TN and have grown Moonglow, Warren, and Blake’s Pride for several years with no fireblight on any of them.
I’ve added Pineapple, Hood, Keiffer, Ayers, and Harrow Sweet recently, so the jury is still out on them.
I think you will be pleased. It sometimes takes a few years to start fruiting but I have had both Warren and Magness fruit in 3 or 4 years while one tree took 6 or 7. But the wait is worth it! PM me about scion wood. BTW, chip budding season is almost here. Maybe chip it this summer for a vigorous tree next spring.
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Personally, I don’t like the hard hybrids. I didn’t grow Pineapple or Hood when I liven in the south but did grow Keiffer. It cooks ok, I guess. Ayers can be quite good and I have never had it blight either here or in MS. Harrow Sweet is becoming one of my favorites. It is precocious - set fruit in its second leaf here and now that it is more mature it has a nice crop. I’m really looking forward to eating it this year.
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Good question! I get most of my wood from the Corvallis repository and trust their virus evaluation. If it is virus infected I don’t multi-graft it. But, that said, I’m sure that some of the wood I get at the scion exchanges is virus infected. So far, I’ve never seen a pear tree that seemed to be infected or affected by multi-grafting. I did have a Tenn tree that may have been virus infected. It was on OHxF97 so should have been vigorous. I topworked it to several varieties and none of those grew well either. So my theory is that either the rootstock or the Tenn wood was infected.
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mayhaw9999 Thanks for the information. It seems a little daunting at times.