@clarkinks how is your Duchesse d’Angouleme Bronzee Doing. My regular duchess is five ft this year so I plan on grafting bronzee to it next year so I would have half a tree each. Curious if you got a taste of it yet.
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Clark-have you ever reported which of your 50 pears are most fire blight resistant?
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Bronze was unfortunate to meet with rutting deer , wind storms, and droughts
I have mentioned before which are the most disease resistant. I could write a book about just 1 pear there is so much to know and very little is said or known now. I hope i live long enough to tell it all.
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I’m finding out more about lead winding up in apple juice. Yes people sprayed with lead in the past we do know that. There is a new offender though i learned about. I’m told many gardens and orchards use waste sludge on their fields which is human waste that has been processed to remove pathogens. I still didnt make the connection until i was told all waste products are processed together not just sewage but also industrial waste which in some cases contains lead which is then put back on the fields. Back to the pears we plant for our heirs i do wonder if this will all be forgotten. I constantly have the feeling this has all been done before.
Digested sewer sludge is suppose to be used only on ornamental plantings. I don’t know anything about the lead content, but would expect that would be looked at before it was used even for ornamentals.
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@alan
I thought that as well and though it is said to be safe im learning more and more of it is being used Questions Remain About Using Treated Sewage on Farms | Civil Eats
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The article is disturbing and new to me. The sludge product I was aware of is Millorganite which I believe to be only used in ornamental plantings.
When the human population triples in less than a century, untenable environmental problems can be expected and difficult to fully appreciate for regular people. The article explains the dangers (no mention of lead, at least) but is very short on potential politically acceptable solutions.
It is a comforting time to believe that God has our backs.
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i know that in a lot of EU countries they are working on plans/thechnologie to seperate nr1 and nr2 at the household level. (thus needing to build a complete seperate extra sewer system)
this to more easily filter out medication. So it does not pollute drinking/surface water and nature.
Another reason is, due to predicted increased peak pressure on sewer systems during increased rainfall intensity. To seperate that. So human waste does not get released during storms.
So we might end up with 4 systems
1 for rainwater
1 for NR1 (filtered mainly to get medicines out. further refined to artificial feriliser. And even some valuble substances which can be refined to medicine again. (wierd idea, but profitable)
1 for NR2’s either refined to artificial ferilizer. Or treated for pathogen and used for organic fertiliser (human manure). (not organic as in certified for organic produce. but organic as in carbon source and natural byproduct organic)
1 for industrial waste. They might merge this with one of the others. But that leads to problems. Like suddenly having lead mixed in with human waste.
i am curious when
The current solotion off “dillute it till it’s below the legal limits”
Will change. We’r discovering more and more that some/most substances do damage proportional to their concentration. And that there is no level at witch they do no damage at all. To me it seems wise to concentrate/reuse or store them safely. Instead of spread the “pain” over a larger area till it’s still there but harder to measure.
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It would seem I am more of a pear snob than ever. How is everyone else doing with your pears? I realize when I read this I didn’t count any non producing trees I grow. It’s a true addiction when you hide it! The other day I found myself saying i did not have many pears when I have thousands of pounds this year. That’s plenty of pears. It doesn’t seem like much to me! I’m not going to run out!
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Pears (euro) are my favorite as well. Taste great, last a long time, grows with minimal problems, wide range of taste, and more. What more could you ask for.
I put in Ubileen last year. Do you have any experience with them. Supposed to be a super early ripening variety, but no one on here has ever talked about them.
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There are members such as @MES111 who grow them though it’s not well known. This thread will give you some great information about them Morettini and Ubileen early pear harvest
I just need to find a pear variety that will grow here and survive fire blight… so far all I have tried… died of FB in year 3 or 4.
Going to try Keiffer, perhaps improved Keiffer, Orient… on Callery rootstock next.
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Improved Kieffer seem to laugh at fireblight here in Kansas. Kieffer get fireblight but they don’t die from it. Have you tried Warren, ayers, Maxine and Potomac?
Are you talking about the Ubileen? If so they are still too small to fruit. I still have not found anyone that knows about them.
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@clarkinks … can’t say for sure that I have tried any of those… I stopped trying on pears after 10 years or so… and that was about 10 years ago when I stopped trying them.
I would plant two… and they grew well but when they started blooming well about year 3… FB showed up and over a couple years… dead. I did that 3 times with different varieties and they all ended the same.
Two varieties I can remember that I tried were Bartlett and Anjou. I got them all from Starks… between 2002 and 2012.
Ps… there are lots of (I think keiffer pear) in my county… and I have seen them get some FB and the owner did nothing and they survived and did well after…
I might try grafting some of our local pear tree scionwood on to callery… pretty sure they are keiffer… and also add some improved keiffer and possibly orient too.
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Trev,
This year if you get some rootstocks in the ground I can send you scion wood next year or bud wood this summer. We get heavy fireblight here. I know what works or doesn’t be glad to help you out. I’m not fully recovered but I’ve been in the orchard and can cut scions. Would graft to tough rootstocks of some type. Most wild Callery laugh at fireblight here.
@clarkinks … thanks… appreciate the help.
I will try to get some callery rootstock collected this winter for grafting to next spring.
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Those are good choices in my opinion.
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