Hi all. I’ve been watching this shoot that came directly from the graft union on a “Patio Conference Pear”.
Rootstock was not specified, but it’s 95% chance to be Quince C if it’s a dwarfing pear sold in Ireland.
Growth from the shoot looks a lot more pear than quince, but looks nothing like the conference scion. There could potentially be an interstem growing out but I doubt an interstem was used with a conference scion.
I could only see one graft, it was more defined last year and the shoot in question came directly from the graft line.
New growth is not fuzzy like quince.
Undersides of leaves are not fuzzy like quince.
Branching is straight 90⁰ horizontal from main stem (not like conference).
There are some large thorns on the branches.
The new growth twigs are vigorous and red tinted.
The leaves are pointy at the end like love hearts.
No flowers or fruit yet to judge off.
I’ve seen Quince E grown out, but not Quince C. Correct me if it looks like Quince C growing out.
The Conference scion was getting diseased, and this shoot from the graft union was much more interesting so I just cut off the conference scion to focus on this shoot.
I’m just Starting to experiment with Quince / interstems trying get Euro pears in production fast. it doesn’t look province or seedling Quince I have but Quince C may be different. I don’t think it’s common in the states.
I don’t think Callery is common in Ireland. We probably do have harbin/ussuriensis as ornamentals but seems a weird interstem. Maybe purely for compatibility? But I could only see one visible graft union.
Agree it looks too shiny for quince which should be fuzzy under leaf and even on new growth.
I don’t think quince can have thorns, but pear can. Conference doesn’t though.
The leaves look pear but pointier, visually different to conference leaves, the bark looks a bit quince, and the 90° branch angles and thorns don’t look much like either to me.
My thinking is, since it doesn’t look like a quince or like the conference scion, it’s obviously a 3rd thing. Since it came from the graft union, it’s either a pear interstem shoot, or a pear quince graft chimera.
Maybe it’s one of the newer dwarfing rootstocks, e.g. pyrodwarf. I don’t think its that one per se but there are a bunch of newer dwarfing rootstocks out there.
This should not be Pyrodwarf. I’m growing some without anything grafted to them at the time to bud graft or chip later this summer. This picture shows it‘s leaves:
Never seen P. betulifolia irl and there’s few detailed pictures of its leaves to be found online but the general shape and serrated edges would fit. It’s not dwarfing at all though
The prospect of a graft chimera sounds really exciting! Fingers crossed.
@nosummer Are there any noticeable dormant buds on the rootstock you could try to stimulate by notching above them? I think its the most surefire way in your situation to figure out if this could be a chimera or if it is simply the rootstock.
