Thank you again
2 Likes
Well, after looking at pics on their site, I’m starting to think it looks more like a Pineapple pear! They only have about 7-8 Euro pears on their site, and I’m pretty sure it’s not a Bartlett, Baldwin, Kieffer, Flordahome, Tenn, or Orient. It kinda looks like a Hood, but that’s supposed to be a softer pear. Maybe this tree is the Pineapple, and the other is an Orient.
@coolmantoole grows a bunch of southern pears, so curious to what he thinks.
2 Likes
Just ate a Winter Nelis that I picked about three weeks ago, chilled for two weeks and then left out to finish. Melting, juicy, not very much grit, average flavor (but without any real summer I guess that’s to be expected) and very close to turning brown in the center, but still edible throughout. A pretty fair pear all things considered.
2 Likes
Richard,
When you talk about “pear taste”, do you mean Euro pear? If so, I’d like to mention that Asian pears do not taste like Euro and do not have the same “pear flavor”, either.
A pears are crips, juicy and sweet (some more, some less). They do not have a complex flavor or even aroma like good Euro pears do.
4 Likes
I would definitely be going for that euro aromatic pear taste. I have never even tasted a A pear that i would put on a salad nonetheless eat outright. The ones i have bought have fed my dogs and compost sadly. I usually only enjoy sweet with tart but bavays gage plum and dates have taught me differently.
2 Likes
What do you think, Seckle? This is one of 2 pear trees that were on my property when we bought the place. Unfortunately this one is close the fence, so the tree rats take them all. Last year was the first time to bear for us. I don’t water it at all, and we are semi-desert here. When you bite into it the first taste is heavily complex and very sweet, but that is followed up with immediate astringency. This is one of two I got before the tree rats did. I put it in the fridge, I’ll take it out in a couple weeks and see if it ripens more on the counter. Last year the fridge and all the counter time they could take had no affect on the astringency. Maybe watering the tree will yield different results in the future too, I don’t know. It’s in an area that needs a lot of work that I don’t really have time for yet. Tons of common buckthorn, chokecherry, and ash competing with it.
4 Likes
That does not look like seckle to me. Im not sure what it is yet but i am thinking it over. Do you have a picture of the leaves? Seckle was ripe here about a month ago.
Update
Actually i just noticed your zone is 5b so perhaps its seckle afterall. They typically are smaller overall than your example and grow in clusters. See the photos below. Not all the pears in the picture are seckle but the red blushed pears are seckle. I should have saw your zone before posting a response.
8 Likes
Here’s the other tree. They will be ready to pick in a week or two, same as last year. They are just getting a bit of sweetness now and still very crispy. The lumps are from hail when they were ping pong ball sized, they got beat up pretty good but didn’t drop. No stone cells, juicy, better flavor than most from the store, they get red blush where they get sun, and turn yellow and soft the more they ripen. The branches with just a few produce real big pears. The shapes are pretty variable, some remind me of Comice, others Bartlett, and then some a bit more round; but they ripen all the same and taste the same. The other half of the tree was callery that I grafted almost all the branches over to 6 different varieties
Any ideas on this one?
Both my trees haven’t had any problems with FB, though I see some strikes on some trees of a neighbors just up the valley.
5 Likes
Clark, do you have any idea what variety the second tree could be?
2 Likes
Im going to look closer at the photos but that rounded shape is typical of kieffer as is the somewhat rounded ball on the end stem where the pear is removed from the tree. The leaves are a tip off so i will look closer a little later.
2 Likes
Amazing the differences year to year. Granted we had about a month less of summer. Overall the pears are 30-40% smaller than last year and not as sweet/flavorful. Last year very little stone cells and this year there are tons, not to mention the hail damage; every hail scar has a pocket of stone cells under it and some of those cells are quite big. This year the skins are wrinkling in storage already too. The only real plus is with zero spray there is almost no coddling moth damage at all, last year about half the crop was damaged.
I dried a bunch the other day that didn’t get the fridge and were just chilling in a box on the garage floor. Pretty good stuff, way better than letting them get over ripe!
2 Likes
I never did update the tasting of the little unknown pear after a few weeks in the fridge and then another week or so on a shelve(so the family didn’t eat it 
). It kept well, didn’t shrivel like the pears from my other tree did this year. The astringency was gone (woowoo!) and the flavor was still very intense with a unique almost spice like flavor I have never tasted in a pear before. I think I am going to start taking better care of that tree and build some sort of squirrel protection for the late summer/fall.
I bought a Seckle pear at Whole Foods the other day, I had never tasted one before. It tasted very similar to my little unknown pear with that unique spice like flavor.
So, my unknown is definitely at least a Seckle cross if not even just a straight-up Seckle.
2 Likes
Hi Clark my name is Gary I would love to talk to you regarding pairs and route stocks
Gary,
Nice to meet you! Please feel free to post about the pears and pear rootstocks. Enjoy the forum its a wealth of information!
Clark
Great looking harvest it sounds like that is an exceptional pear!
Hi Clark can you share with me your experience with Korean giant with betufolia callyerana and old home 87 or 97… for a zone 5B pros and cons of each thank you and any other info would be great
1 Like
Any of those in my opinion would be fine for 5b but my preference for asian pears is always BET rootstock
Gary,
This is a public forum. If I were you, I would not post my phone number for all to see.
After you have posted a 15-20 posts, I think, you will be able to private message Clark.
1 Like