Pear buds, blossoms, and fruit 2017

@clarkinks I got the spot cut out this afternoon. It had not changed so it didn’t look like it had spread any. There was a bit of darkened area under the bud area and I didn’t know if that was just from the bud or the blight so I cut it out. It looked like clean wood underneath. There was a small twig that might have looked darkened at the bloom site…I might have imagined it but that is gone now too. I was pleased that it looked the same as yesterday but maybe even a bit contracted. So I don’t put any protectant on the open bark?

Katy

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Looks great Katy

Fire blight is a very fast spreading disease so it looks like it will be fine. If it were bleeding lots of sap on the other hand you would have needed to seal it up because some pests attack any tree that is bleeding a lot.

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Petals are now falling on my early blooming pears and the trees are shaping up quickly. Some pears buds are showing color and should open soon.

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Clark,

Looks like your pears season are safe this year. I got a couple takes on the improved Keiffer pear grafts. Is that the yellow and reddish fruits? How good is the taste? You also have the small yellow pear. Is that one a seedling? I am not sure I grafted this one.

Tony

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You can see the improved kieffer on this thread Here comes the 2016 apple and Pear harvest!
Flavor is fine but nothing outstanding. They taste like a store bought bartlett more for cooking, canning, etc. .There is really very little outstanding about improved kieffer pears but That they consistently produce huge crops! The pears are large but not as large as some such as Duchess. The size makes them very easy to work with and I nearly always wind up with more than I can use. We should appreciate them more because they never seem to take a year off like some pears do. We pick them when we start to get a few windfalls then they ripen inside to a yellow and sometimes have a red blush. The small yellow pear was sold to me and mislabeled by the arbor society as fashioned kieffer. It produced repulsive fruit the first year or two barely better than a green walnut husk and then everything changed and I realized the fruit was remarkable. It’s a wonder I did not graft that tree over. The red blushing bartlett is another possible mislabel but for now that’s what I call it and it ripens in July. It’s a nice pear but like any bartlett it’s ok but lacks any exceptional pear flavor. They are pleasant and pleasing but lack the hint of real flavor you get from those such as harrow sweet. Harrow sweet provokes you with its flavor almost saying it’s exceptional but only very good. Harrow sweet for speed of production, taste, growth habit etc. is a great pear. I would peel harrow sweet because I detect a bitterness in the skin but not the flesh. It may not be that way everywhere or even here because the one I ate was not grown locally.

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Yeah, The red blushing Bartlett in the attached thread looked good. I grafted all the scions that you sent to me a few years back but I neglected to label them on my multi grafted pear trees. I hoped one of the graft is that one. I just have to wait and see.

Tony

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Tony your very close by so worse case scenario you can get some buds to tbud later this summer if you want. That yellow pear is easy to grow. It would take practically if I grafted it to an elm tree. The pears are terrible the first year or two but once you try it when it’s at it’s peak you won’t forget it. I may try to ship you a couple of pears this year as close as you are.

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so far it’s looking like It will be very good year for pears. I wish I had done something to thin the fruit on the kieffer. Here is a picture of an Asian pear about a week ago

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Those look amazing. It must be something in this Kansas soil or the weather that’s making them do so well here this year!

Another Asian and the kieffer

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What rootstock is the kieffer on, sure is blooming nice,

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Thanks.
The kieffer is the first picture that is done blooming and will be breaking branches this summer. It is a very large old tree. I would guess it’s on standard seedling stock like betulifolia.

I’m not sure About the Asian. When I asked Willis Orchard Company where I got it they said “it’s on it’s own Stock”? I fear it might be on harbin and get huge.

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Mike,
Your going to have pears to throw at the moon. I’m not sure what tree could possibly do better in this area than a pear. Your about 25-30 minutes away @39thparallel which I think says a lot about our location in regards to pears. I wish I could take all the credit I get for growing good pears but a lot is just recognizing that pears grow good here on their own.

I think your right. More people would plant pears if they had ever had anything but the boring, off season, under ripe fruit from the grocery. I can’t wait to try all the verietys you are planting out.

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This year, it looks like the only pear of mine to flower again is Harrow Sweet. Several blooms forming on this little tree.

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I was out looking at my pears, and saw this on my Moonglow, looks like the start of some blooms. I’m very surprised that there would be anything like this on this tree, even tho it was a larger tree when it went into the ground. About an inch thick trunk and about 5ft tall at planting. The leaves got hit pretty bad by Japanese beetles, but it seems to be doing well now.

I dont expect the blooms to become fruit, but it is cool to see our trees waking up. Some of our old apple trees are starting to show some small pink buds.

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Sorry…I can’t help myself!!

Haven’t seen any more evidence of fb. (I posted this last night and looking at the photo I thought I had missed fb at the base of this fruit. But I looked at the tree today and there is none…The camera just made it darker than it is in real life)

Katy

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Wow- my pears aren’t even as far along as Clarks’s were almost a month ago. I am just seeing the buds which will become blooms swell up (somewhere between swollen bud and bud burst). The exciting thing for me is that my Magness is finally covered, in year #6.

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Bob,

You are gonna love Magness. October and November was made for Magness. Guard those pears against the squirrels. Congrats.

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