I’ll be most obliged if you’ll join me for a beer at the clubhouse, Jafar. It’s right around the bend.
Dax
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I grafted this Pai Li 
AKA Beijing White with the scion from the USDA Corvallis a few years back. It produced these nice round plum size pears. My wife really like the mildly sweet taste with a hint of European in them.
Tony
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Great looking pears Tony!
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@Barkslip
How are the small yellow pears doing? Curious if anyone growing them is getting close to time for them to fruit? The small yellow pear is quite unique with its occasional thorns as a baby, small delicious yellow fruit, 2 crops a year many times etc. Those charateristics are very unusual!
I was collecting scions from the Walmart tree I grafted and it’s getting up there. 8’ I suppose and 4’ wide.
The smaller grafts I sold one I think and lost all the rest to winter inside my hoophouse.
Dax
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Going to check again if anyone else got blooms this year?
Not seeing anything yet- but the graft is just a year old, so it’s too early anyway. All the scions I grafted took off nicely, so I’m excited - Thanks, Clark!
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No blooms here.
Dax
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Second leaf. No bloom.
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Can’t wait to see others getting fruit! Dont expect much the first year but the pears improve the next year or two. I t-budded another in July 2016 and it has flowers this year. The other small yellow pear I tbudded im top working over. These pears dont keep long enough than to have 2 trees.
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Yes its delicious!
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Im suspecting this pear is either an old home cross Pear rootstocks influence on Fruit size or one of the Canadian crosses Canadian Pears Enie, Menie, Miney, Moe, Phileson . Im getting the mystery narrowed down but the pear taste awfully good to be a common rootstock. Time will tell and next year I will get oh20 and oh50 and see if this little yellow pear is one of the crosses that made up the modern rootstocks we use today. Its not the modern rootstock but it may be the parent of one of them. Im suspicious because OH50 (seedling of original old home) https://npgsweb.ars-grin.gov/gringlobal/accessiondetail.aspx?accid=PI+541238 is as close as I have seen. Now the real question is since we know OH50 is a cross between bartlett x old home x unknown is it the relative or the actual small yellow pear. This would explain a lot because harrow delight https://npgsweb.ars-grin.gov/gringlobal/accessiondetail.aspx?accid= PI541431 is also a good quality pear made of the same type of cross in Canada. This is what ars grin said " Harrow Delight (PI 541431). -Introduced for early fresh market and home garden use. Originated at Research Station., Harrow, Ontario, Canada by H.A. Quamme, Agr. Canada. Introduced in 1982. Purdue 80-15 (Old Home x Early Sweet) x Bartlett. Cross made by R.E.C. Layne, Research Station., Harrow; selected in 1973; tested as HW-603. Fruit: 5% smaller than that of Bartlett; ovate-pyriform, shallow, broad basin; flesh quality high, juicy, grit equal to that of Bartlett, flavor as good as that of Bartlett but distinctly different; skin light-green to yellow-green color with 20% to 30% covered with a light blush, no russeting; processed fruit inferior to that of Bartlett and only a little better than that of Kieffer; ripens 2 weeks before Bartlett. Tree: spreading; vigor moderate; productive; leaves ovate with rounded base, leaf serrations indistinct; flowers white; resistance to fire blight slightly less than Old Home. Cross fertile with Bartlett, Bosc, Anjou, and Harvest Queen. - Brooks and Olmo Register of Fruit and Nut Varieties
Cold hardy; successfully fruited in Anchorage, Alaska. – Paul Lariviere, 2006"
We know according to genetic testing Old home x farmingdale (ohxf) is actually (ohxb) old home x bartlett Old Home x Bartlett? | Good Fruit Grower and with that relatively new information the good quality of the seedlings makes more since. Harrow delight is just one example of high quality fruit from bartlett x rootstock crosses. Everyone is aware years ago i would have thought of this pear as being a possible rootstock and i did but all i had to compare it to is what we use as rootstocks such as ohxf87, 333, 97 etc… this is what they look like which does not resemble it enough to think its anything but a child of it (shown below) leaves etc are to light and growth to different, no suckers etc.!
Another reason i ruled out the harbor day society using this pear as a rootstock is it would be a terrible choice for one because it suckers profusely on its own roots unlike modern rootstocks (shown below)
Remember originally i bought this pear from the harbor day society as old fashioned kieffer. I trim off those suckers every year. They may be digging those up as rootstocks. Mislabeling pears is common by nurseries and there is no sign its improving now. Im very thankful for this delicious mislabeled tree but im going to keep looking until i find out where it actually came from. The taste is to good, fireblight resistance to strong, and it grafts to easily to be anything short of an intentional cross. Most men might say who cares what its name is it tastes good im growing it. The pear deserves the name and people in the future deserve to know how useful it is. In the meantime we can call it small yellow pear. If this pear was crossed with harrow delight or harrow sweet etc think of what it could be like! Im making sure this one does not get lost to time (its to valuable for that) like other pears have.
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Great research, Clark. Here’s my 1-year change over of an inexpensive Bartlett to your Small Yellow Pear. 7’ tall and 3’ wide after pruning. I grafted the main trunk and then pruned to (2) side branches that I switched over, too.
I grafted Harrow Sweet to it a week or so ago. Hopefully both will flower next year.
Dax
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Looks great you should have some fruit pretty soon! The flavor of that yellow pear is second to none ive had! Seckel is good but the small yellow pear can be much better on a good year. Harrow sweet is a perfect pollin partner since the blooms overlap.
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My sisters children are still teenagers and though they have a bit to learn about graft placement they made their first graft this year. It was my small yellow pear on callery! Thats a picture from one of my sisters orchards.
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Does it look like anyone will get fruit this year ftom the small yellow pear?
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Not this year - maybe next. My scions got good growth and are nice and horizontal, but they’re just not far enough along to have spurs yet.
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I know, I can’t wait to look. I Googled how many weeks to fruit a branch in water and it said 4-5 for pears. I’ve got my email calendar marked for a week apart to remove a few branches from my fridge so I’ll have pollen. I don’t know which of my grafts may/may not have flowers. I’ve now got a 15’ “Small Yellow” from putting it on a 8-10 gallon pear. Haven’t checked though for spurs. It shot that leader about 8-9 foot I suppose after last year’s growth. I’ll check into it later when I think of it.
Dax
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