Move it sooner than later, IMO.
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I’m going to move it tomorrow, it’s going to be cloudy and cool around 57 degrees and it’s going to rain on Tuesday. The weather all week looks cool and a bit overcast with rain, which should make it less stressful on the tree.
Thanks for the advice,
Matthew
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Here is a picture of the fruit Fedco posted! Had I not been a little suspicious I would have been growing it
This is the post regarding novelty pears http://www.growingfruit.org/t/novelty-pears/10474/3
This is the description fedco posted “Ginnybrook Fall. Unknown origin, possibly Belchertown, MA. This is the
largest pear anyone at Fedco has ever seen. Gigantic and very oddly
shaped, like a huge potato, 4" wide and more than 5" long. Even the
smaller specimens are bigger than a Bartlett. Dull yellow skin, mostly
covered with light tan russet. Crisp, perfumy and very juicy. Best for fresh
eating and perry. Introduced to us by Hope Guardenier of Belchertown. She
brought very good perry to the 2013 CiderDays. She gave me two pears.
Wow! We have yet to identify the variety. For now, Hope calls it
Ginnybrook. Ripens in October and keeps about a month. Z4. ME Grown.
235A Ginnybrook,”
Here is what a pear infected with stony pit looks like https://extension.psu.edu/pear-disease-stony-pit
Stony pit is not widely understood and it has not been isolated. Pear virus can be highly challenging to isolate. Here is more information http://postharvest.tfrec.wsu.edu/marketdiseases/pearstony.html. When pear growers become infected by the virus and they grow Bosc they topwork to Bartlett which Is a carrier that shows no symptoms. This puts them back in the fruit sales business but if scions are taken from those trees more trees are infected though there is an absence of appearance of the virus. If you Graft Bosc to the tree you can isolate if it is in fact stonypit virus or if the pits are a genetic variation. I suspect the ginnybrook pear is a Bosc seedling but it’s only a suspicion. If I’m right it explains everything.
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Thank you clarkinks for posting the picture and for all the information. I moved the tree on Monday, I didn’t plant it in the front yard but instead put it in the front of a row of dwarf apples on m111 and bud9. The apples are planted with 12 ft spacing and the pear is only 15 ft in front. I know the pear which is on OHxF97 will over grow and shadow the apples eventually, but I didn’t have many other options. I’m excited to see what this pear tree becomes, and I like the odd look of the pears.
Thanks again
Matthew
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Does this still exist? Anyone got scions, Fedco no longer carries it.
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The only way you will find out what happened to the pear in my opinion is contact the farm in that area with the name I’m guessing. Again If anyone asks I’d it’s stonypit infected I would say yes that’s my suspicion but it could attract stinkbugs or have other genetic anomalies that cause the pears to have that appearance.
Ginny Brook Farm
226 Turkey Hill Rd, Belchertown, MA 01007
Owner - Kenneth Hislop
Ginny Brook Farm is located in Belchertown, Massachusetts, and was founded in 1984. At this location, Ginny Brook Farm employs approximately 2 people. Annual sales for Ginny Brook Farm are around USD 103,537.00.
@MatthewInVA
How did the ginnybrook pear turn out for you?
We know the lady who the pear came from is Hope Guardenier and you can read more about her here Hope Guardenier is an environmental educator and lifelong gardener. She’s lived in the Valley since 2001, and in 2007 founded
Celebrities such as Martha Stuart grow the ginnybrook pear no doubt for its novelty purposes My Growing Orchard - The Martha Stewart Blog
@alan business is to care for Orchards of the ultra wealthy. Many times when they say they grow pears such as ginnybrook they really mean Alan or someone like him advises them of the care for these pears. I’m not implying Alan takes care of Martha’s orchard at the moment I’m saying he has similar clients. He is a legendary orchardist. Perhaps his clients grow this novelty pear.
Ginnybrook is discussed in other parts of the site eg. Novelty pears?
The Ginnybrook pear does well for me. Its a pretty tree and it grows with a lot of vigor. It has not been effected by blight or rust so far. The blooms are large and it has fruited well this year but the wasps and hornets are getting most of them before they are even ripe. I did get a few last year and they were a bit more russet in color but they managed to ripen fully on the tree. I do not know if I will get any this year because of insect damage. I was away in Baltimore for a few weeks and missed some late season spraying.
Clark you might be right about the odd shape coming from insects. I do not think it is stony pit but the insects go at this pear more than my others. I will post some pictures of the fruit later today. A few years ago you mentioned you thought it was a seedling of bosc and again I think you are correct. The flavor and fully ripe fruit is very reminiscent of Bosc.
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@matthewinVA
Thank you for your report on this pear the more pictures we have the better. If the damage is stink bug damage which looks identical to stony pit virus there could be some some that do not have the deformed appearance. As I said before it could be genetics or stony pit virus. I the event it is a virus that does not mean that’s a deal breaker for everyone to not grow it. Once we see pictures of leaves and pears it will tell us a great deal more.
Here are some pictures of my Ginnybrook tree that I just took and a picture of a branch from this spring. Its hard to tell in the pictures but the fruit is large and the leaves are large as well. The leaves are typically a very dark large glossy green but they have gotten a bit discolored at this point in the year.
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That tree does not appear to suffer from stony pit virus. Very good looking tree @MatthewInVA. Perhaps you can give out scions when you prune to Corvallis and individuals to ensure the variety will continue. The tree appears to be lost at this time to commercial growers.
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I will try to reach out to Corvallis, I have received scions from them in the past so it would be a nice way to pay it forward.
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Absolutely we need to do what we can to preserve these varities.
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I wouldn’t mind some scion I’ll pay shipping if you have some extra.
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Yes they usually log them and say donated by Matthew. It’s a good thing to do and then those of us who do research or trial pears have them available in future years. Grow some fruits so rare I might be the only one or one of 2 people growing them. It’s not a good idea something could happen to me like it does to all of us and I don’t want good varities lost forever. Already did that with a large wild pumpkin (10- 25 pounds+) as a child. We had many that grew wild and produced heavily but now that variety is lost forever and it’s a shame it was better than any other type I’ve seen.
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fullplate, I have never sent scion wood to anyone yet and am not sure if I would send it correctly. I think I will try to send some this year to Corvallis as Clarkinks has suggested. I wont mind sharing more scions of this tree in the years to come but the tree is still relatively small and young. Additionally, being a bit inexperienced at collecting and sending scions, I will start with one or two attempts for this year and try for more next.
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Clarkinks,
I understand this sentiment. When I was a kid there was a large pear tree growing in public field near my neighborhood. The tree was as large as an oak with huge pears. I have no idea how old it was, what kind it was or if it was just a chance seedling. The tree has since been cut down and is forever lost. I did manage to look near where the old tree was two years ago and found what is likely a seedling of it. The possible seedling tree is growing about a 150 ft away downhill from where the old tree was. It is in a thicket of trees near the edge of the field. Anyway, long story short I collected pears from it two years ago and grew out seedlings from that tree. I took scions, but I did not store them correctly and they shriveled up. I might attempt to get more scions from the tree this year but the pears are not particularly worth saving. The genetics of the wild tree do seem worth saving for rootstock purpose though which is why I wanted to grow some of the seeds. Also, I wanted to grow some for sentimental value as I believe this is the closest I will get to having a piece of the lost large pear tree from my childhood. The seedlings have done well so far.
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Add me to that group 
I will gladly pay you for this. I would love to add this to my rare collection.
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Can you give us another follow up on ginnybrook? We all want to know how it is doing and what the real name of this pear is if it has another name. This may be a seedling.
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Clarkinks, I’ll gladly give an update.
The tree is doing good. It seems to be a bit biannual in fruit production, this year I got a bunch of fruit last year not so much. It also seems to be fairly resistant to fire blight. Fire blight took out my Seckle pear this year and hit a few of my other trees badly, but the Ginnybrook didn’t get a spot of it. Neither did my Kieffer or Gem pear.
IMO the tree is probably a seedling, maybe of Kieffer and Bosc. Seems highly likely to me to have Kieffer parentage based on the fruit texture and a bit from the taste. The tree also just looks a lot like my Kieffer tree, and blooms about the same time.
The fruit does not look much like the description from Fedco other than the size and bit of russeting. It’s possible I got a mislabeled tree or the cause of the oddly shaped fruit on the original tree was not genetic, like insect damage as you suggested. I will say the fruit does not seem that uniform, some are round, others are more classic pear shaped and they vary wildly.
Overall, it’s a great tree that produces huge fruit, so far has been disease free and I’m glad I planted it. The only issue I have with it is the branches do snap frequently from the weight of the fruit, so it needs a lot of thinning.
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Do you have scion wood your willing to share this year? It sounds like a winner we should try to preserve. You might want to sell scions on ebay or give some out to ensure the variety lives on. If the fruits are very large and branches snap often i’m curious when does it ripen? It may be Duchess D’ Angoulme but i really dont think it is.