Callery pears and betulifolia can be pests like cedar, elms many other trees. Callery and betulifolia are great rootstocks but you can’t graft an elm and there are a lot of apples with CAR damage. I’ve been wrong before but in my opinion callery is a great rootstock to grow pears in places you can’t grow them normally. In Kansas they are not invasive at this time but no doubt will be someday. Tordan kills any tree so if they are becoming invasive in places it can be corrected. Myself I graft them over and enjoy their strong will to live. I have some soil poor enough to kill them.
We’ve got bradfords in our yard from the original owners. In the field bordering us there are wild bradfords popping up that I’ve been grafting on to, just because I’m new to the game, and figured why not. I grafted to them last year and had great success.
The main problem is that they come up like a briarbush and I have to aggressively prune/mow/hack down the ones I don’t want. I am experimenting with braiding some of the thin stalks just to make some interesting tree art.
Community planning boards work in mysterious ways. I believe the city knew that if they came after me they’d have a large class action lawsuit on their hands.
those things are awful smelling. don’t know why they are chosen as the tree to be planted
Richard, I’d like you to go after the volcano mulching next. I’m too chicken to do anything but I constantly wonder why my tax dollars are being spent to plant trees, then actively try to kill them.
You’re sort of like the Arbor Day Robin Hood…Taking covert action against city boards that don’t know their posterior from a hole in the ground when it comes to trees.
There are plenty of escaped Bradfords around here and they are spreading. I wonder WTH people are thinking. They smell, they produce all those small hard pears that can turn ankles if you step on them, they’re always shedding branches…
There were two in our yard when we moved here, and one of the first things I did was chop them down and dig the roots up.
If people want a flowering tree, Why not try a redbud? One of the native magnolias? They’re native plants and I can’t think of anything the Cleveland Pear does better than them.
It’s like you’re vacationing in the Loire Valley and buy all your meals at McDonalds and only drink Bud Lite. It’s just one of the worst possible choices when you have so many better options.
No Callery here despite the zone 5 hardiness. Instead, we have the unstoppable Asian Multiflora Roses spreading to everywhere. They even take over the wooded sections that get enough light. It’s so bad that I now wear saftey glasses when in brushy or wooded areas. Once, I almost lost an eye when one grabbed me from behind and wrapped its thorny tentacles around my face. I don’t think they are from Asia. I think they’re from another planet.
We have already been invaded. The Callery pear is everywhere in my area.
No Bradford or Callery pears around here, probably too cold for them. Ussurian pear would be about it for “wild” pears that could survive here I think.
Multiflora Roses in some areas are in decline due to rose rosette disease. http://www.rose.org/rose-care-articles/rose-rosette-disease-sadly/
The curious thing in our locale is they normally do not propagate by seed. Instead, they are propagated by disingenuous wholesale tree brokers who persuade municipalities that they’re getting a great deal on boulevard trees.
I’ve heard about it. I can’t wait. I wonder if someone would be willing to ship me some infected roses.