Korean Giant is a very vigorous Asian pear and is worth a try on callery. I trialed it on several callery this year with positive results on over half of them. In general callery are not the best choice for Asian pears. Like you I have been looking for something that would be a good interstem for other Asian pears. BET and harbin pears are much better rootstock for asian pears. Oxh97 and kieffers are other possibilities as interstems. OHxf97 seems to be a good rootstock for Asians. Perhaps in a couple of years of testing I will be able to provide a better answer but for now you have a 50% chance (depending on genetics of the callery) Korean giant will work. If the callery is a seedling hybrid you have a very good chance Korean giant will work excellent. What 3 Euros worked well? If I know what worked good we might have an idea of the genetics of the callery. I have a few wild callery that I have only found one compatible fruiting pear for them.
Magness, Harrow Sweet, and Sekel all took on this tree.
Sounds like a wild callery. Your best bet is try Korean Giant I think it will take. Hopefully thatās not a pear you tried already. If you tried that KG already I would graft ohxf interstem in between and that should work.
I have not found one pyrus cultivar asian, european, or other that wonāt take and live (growing is another matter entirely thoughā¦) on pyrus calleryana all of mine are seedling pyrus grown from seeds of the aristocrat variety i got in bulk from willamette nurseries in Oregon. All of them look different most of them have wicked thorns some have no thorns and leaves that look a hawthron and appeared to be a cross of pyrus betulaefolia or pyrus pyrifolia based on my best guess.
Those are the hybrids I mentioned earlier. Those type of seedlings are ideal rootstocks because they have both European and Asian rootstock in their genetics. They also donāt have the week branch structure because of the aristocrat parent. Those are the hybrids that take over entire fields and become invasive. Many times they have fireblight resistance but not always because aristocrat does not have resistance. Donāt let any of those hybrids flower or they will escape into the wild via birdās and reproduce quickly. They have the genetics with those thorns to defend against rabbits etc. Those would make great interstems for the trees out there that wonāt take a graft.
oddly I have two of the seedling calleryana trees that are 8 years old over 12 ft tall and have never flowered once. I knew they were invasive when the root suckers just kept coming back they have survived being mowed to the ground numerous times, sprayed with roundup, hot cooking oil, and flooded with over 3ft of SALT WATER. I now dig them out and use them as free rootstocks.
A possibility is that they might be crossed with the Chinese Sand Pear which was brought to North America which is what most of the fire blight European type pears are hybridized with. They seem to be gone now, but old remember stands of sand pears growing along fence rows in SE Georgia once upon a time. There are stands of callery pears, clearly from root stock, growing in old abandoned pear orchards in the Portal Georgia area. These Callery pears also have fairly large fruit. I wondering if folks back in the day found that it was easier grafting onto Callery if there was some other sort of pear in the genetics. Or maybe back in the day, the callery nurseries got seed for ruitstock from just happened to be growing near other pears and therefor tended to be hybrids. Anyway, I donāt know. Iām just offering some possibilities. But while Japanese type pears are newish to American agriculture, their more fire blight resistant but very hard cousin, the sand pear is not.
By the way, I wonder what the potential for these large fruited callery pears is for being useful for making siders and bears? In sider making, bitter is not a bad thing. God bless.
Marcus
OHxF 513 is reputedly excellent for both Euro and Asian pear varieties - supposedly Asian pear decline is not an issue with 513. Iāve built a number of pear trees with a 10 inch interstem of 513 between the fruiting variety and callery understock.
As 513 is āsemi-dwarfingā, producing a tree 65-75% of standard, I donāt anticipate appreciating much in the way of dwarfing.
For those of you looking for Callery rootstocks to use for your orchard pears now is a really good time to find them. Most wild callery pears have a red or yellow foliage this time of year so they should be easy to track down. You can graft them in the spring if you dig them out and plant them in your orchard now. Donāt worry about letting all the leaves fall off.
I live in that area as well. Now all your see in the spring is hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of Bradford pear type trees all along I75 and also the other highways. Some of the empty acres and lots between the farm fields look like Bradford pear tree farms. The trees are scattered in no rows and are of different heights and sizes. Seems this species had become invasive since so many people use the Bradford pear, or versions of that, as an ornamental tree.
I agree with you something has changed to cause these trees to go crazy and populate everywhere. Also another invasive species around the same area is the honeysuckle. Just as bad as the wild callery trees except the vines run everywhere.
I never remember these things being this invasive years ago. Mutations? Not enough long cold weather. We get bouts of warm almost spring like weather and then some col weather. Not enough long boring cold gray dreary winter weather to kill some of these things off.
Sounds like an interesting combination. I like the height factor with that combination. I have not seen too many places with some 513 rootstocks.
Older thread, but 1 week ago I grafted some KG on wild Callery/Bradford pear. I think I did about 10-15 grafts of it. Some cleft and some whip-and-tongue. Iāll chime back in with my results in a few weeks!
I have some backup Kieffer that Iāll graft back in if any of those fail and Iāll use those to interstem possible.
This was my first year to try these type of grafts. Last year was my first try with bark grafting and I did very well. Whip and tongue got really eat by the last few.
Thanks for sharing your wisdom!
I put some Korean Giant on callery about a year ago and so far itās doing ok. Callery pears that i planted and grafted a year ago are much more compatible than any of the others Iāve tried.
I saw around a billion callery pears as I was driving around Kansas City today. Here are some pictures right off I-35. I may have to collect some next winter.
Is Callery the same as Calleryana?
Today I did some detective work and found out that pear trees that Lowes sell in our area are grafted on Calleryana rootstock. Came here to read up on it and found this thread. Wondering if itās the same.
Yes they are one in the same.
A question on this old thread. I have a Pineapple and Orient on Callery rootstock. They were planted about two years ago. The PA has been a beast, growing up to maybe 10-12ft tall, and has many thick scaffolds. The Orient has been quite a bit more slower to develop, but had a good growth spurt last year.
My question is about the cold hardiness of this RS. Over the last couple weeks, weāve got down to about 0 here on the hill, and I assume it was below zero down where these trees are at. Should I be worried about the trees not making it thru this cold spell? My other pears are on pear seedling (Bartlett?) and OHxF87. Iām not too worried about them, tho.
Callery are hardy here in zone 5 . They survive minus 20 easily here .
Their cold tolerance is grossly understated! They have survived -20F here as well but these are seedlings.
How are some of the callery trees that were top worked in last year or two doing? Typically in just 2-4 years depending on location and tree you get pears. Anyone have one that will be fruiting this year?