Picking the last frozen pears

Always enjoy leaving a few pears until the very last minute. It’s November 12th and in Kansas that means we are out of time. If I want to eat a few late season pears off the tree last week was fine. Today i took a bite of a frozen Duchess D’ Angoulme but it was delicious. It’s 23 degrees today and as you might assume these pears will be consumed very soon. Nothing could be better.







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im jealous!

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That’s awesome!

I just planted one of those this fall that @hillbillyhort grafted. It’s a nice size and looks good, so as long as nothing outside my control happens to it, I expect it to fruit in a few years. Glad to know that I might expect late pears!

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Animals stole the last douglas pears so i hope they put on some good fat for winter from them.The Duchess D’ Angoulme grow inside my fenced in orchard. They are much harder to steal inside the fence. Douglas is believed to be the resulting cross of kieffer and Duchess D’ Angoulme. Lots of animals stealing this year which is very unusual. If they need them they are welcome to them i have more than i need.

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Absolutely delicious. Let them thaw a few hours and they are wonderful. Hard to stop eating them.

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Just seeing them and hearing how delicious they are makes me anxious to have my own Duchess pear tree produce some fruit. I only have three pear trees in my orchard. I am glad the Duchess is one of those I have. A Kieffer and Abate Fetel are the other two.

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@MikeC

Always tell everyone they are not the highest quality but they are the highest quality ripening this time of year. This cold weather makes them fabulous. If they ripen in October they are not as good as they are if they get the really cold nights of November. They are very heavy producers as well. They are a delicious blend of sour and sweet as they come off the trees now. They are still firm when they thaw just now starting to soften a little. The wood is brittle and they are given to overbearing. These pears im picking are all very large with a one pound pear being farely normal. These pears a 1 1/2 pound can occur regularly but not as common. They have no diseases and need no spray. @MikeC take a look at this thread you wont have long to wait.

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I will definitely remember not to pick them early. I will wait until we get some cold weather, like today. It snowed here today. Day/night temps for the next few days of 34/28, 41/22, 43/30, 38/29, 25/22, 31/16.
So is and when I get some Duchess pears I can pick them after it gets this cold for a day or more? Or should I pick them at the time I get one day of temps in the 20’s?
Thank you.

My outdoors today.

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@MikeC

You want to pick those you want to keep in cold storage early in October in my zone. They will keep months. The tree ripened ones are much better so i leave some on the tree and let them.actually ripen up. Depending on how much sun they get determines when they ripen. Some years its to hot very early and i pick in September. Those years we warm up in February. This year we were warming up in may and June so my pears were far behind getting ripe. Dont plant them in a cool shady spot or you will be picking them on Christmas.

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We get some weird weather at times in winter. This year we got temps in the 70’s in February and then it when down back into the normal temps. We get high temps in the summer, high 90’s to at times low 100’s. It is usually blistering hot and humid in August. The type of weather where it just feels like you are breathing the air coming out of a water vaporizer. Then we can usually get the weather you see in my photo this time of the year. “Boom, it is Winter and here is your snow to prove it”- signed Mother Nature.
My Duchess is in full sun until late afternoon into evening.

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@MikeC

That will be the perfect location and weather for it. If it’s not hot in the summer it would never get ripe. The douglas blooms first and like its parent Duchess D’ Angoulme is one of the last to ripen. My zone can barely ripen these pears.

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Sounds like I may have picked a good pear choice. I liked this variety even more by looking at your posts.

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@MikeC

It is still fairly pleasant outside here so far. Noone agrees they are not used to the cold yet. This is like heavan for winter time. It dropped down to 18 F briefly.

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Just what I was thinking, Im ashamed to say!

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Are they hard and crunchy?

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@ltilton

Yes they are hard and crunchy. They are extremely sweet.

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Im getting 5 tree from Mike this week!

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@noogy

That is a lot of pears! They produce very heavy. Since these trees are given to heavy production the only things that slows them down is branch breaking. Mike’s trees originally came from these so you know what your getting when you see the photos. The original tree my scions came from produced very large pears just like these Largest / Best tasting pear.

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I plan on selling these along with it’s history… I already have several wealthy people who want to host fruit parties and are all excited about pears now. Don’t know if the parties are worth my time unless I sling some tupperware and lingerie alongside…jk

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Had another 30 pounds more finished picking today inside the orchard off all the remaining trees. Leave all the windfalls for the animals. Had to get the fruit picker for some of them. All the higher up pears drop quickly but the ones within about 12 -15 feet of the ground can hang very late like these did. Pears are very interesting because i believe other factors sometimes come into play not easily recognized. These Duchess D’ Angoulme are grafted to callery pears. When they were first grafted the scion wood showed no signs of life sometimes for months then grew away quickly. The trees do not seem to get diseases that other pears do. Today November 13th i’m harvesting a few of these later pears which is unusual as well. Maybe like people havig different metabolic rates pear trees have a similar process. It is interesting to speculate why these trees are so different. Some of these pears were a little rough but they look pretty good overall.











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