We ate one more Comice and Concorde tonight. Both were very good. Comice’s brix was 15 (previously 14).
Concorde was 16 ( previously 13).
They both were very nice, smooth (no grit) pears with aroma. Tonight, Comice is softer (more melting?) than Concorde but Concorde was sweeter.
Not sure how disease resistant these two varieties are. They are very tasty pears.
Maureen,
My rescue is similar to yours so like you it’s early for me to comment but it’s been fine so far.
I was always curious about Potomac. When I ordered my Contender peach from Adams County, I wanted to get a pear with it to offset the shipping charges a bit. I ended up getting a Harrow Sweet, but seriously considered a Potomac and Shenandoah.
How does the Potomac compare to a HS? Have you (or any others here) tried a Shenandoah?
When we were last at the orchard they had Magness and HS, they seemed to taste the same and had similar texture.
I think Harrow Sweet had the highest brix because it’s our home grown product. We let it fully ripen resulting better taste.
Abbe Fetel, Comice, Concorde, Magness, Potomac, Taylor’s Gold all bought from the Cornell Orchard store. Even then, they tasted really good. I bet any of these home grown varieties would rival Harrow Sweet.
Of all the one we tasted, we detected some acidity in Potomac compared to the rest. To me, it was a positive element as it made the taste more balanced and interesting. I think, in the end, they all tasted similarly, all are excellent, sweet, melting pears. You can’t go wrong with any of them.
I’d say Abbe Fetel and Potomac are large pears. That counts for something 
Harrow Sweet and Comice are on the other end.
Fire blight is a serious pear issue and should be taken into consideration. Since there isn’t any noticeably diference in their eating quality, I would go with varieties that have good disease resistance in your area.
Keep in mind, diseases or disease resistance can be regional, too.
I totally agree. There are so many good tasting pears with FB resistance I will mostly grow these types. The taste of different pears is similar with a few exceptions but apples have a wide variation and I sometimes get away from the disease resistant types.
I hope to have a chance to try other pears that I’ve heard good reviews about them like Aurora, Harvest Queen, Docteur Desportes, Tyson, to name a few.
I do graft both pears and apples that are not known for blight resistance. So far, I’ve dodge a bullet with copper spray at dormant.
There are so many new members here so I mentioned fire blight as a warning. Older members like us, we grow at our own risk
Abbé Fétel
I post this foto because this specimen looks somewhat different than the one posted earlier by Mamuang. (They can even have a little blush.) This was the last one on the tree so, I suppose, it would be considered picked late: Oct 18th, at the NCGR near Corvallis. (Resemblance to Norma Jean was unintentional.)
Seedy,
Do you like the taste? We went back to the store two more times in Nov. Bought Abbe Fetel on one of these last two trips (they were gone on the second trip). They looked similar to your in coloring. The long neck is what I can recognize the fruit. It tasted excellent in the second trial, too. You are fortunate to have access to the source.
We bought whatever E pears still sold at the store. I noticed that some pears started to have internal rot by the time we had them. That is the unfortunate issue with E pears
That is how they are supposed to look. They can also have green on them and red blush.
Absolutely! Here is a video of what abate fetel look like when they are grown right in Italy https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RF8HraBLYtE
There is some insect damage or ?? on a few specimens…but not many. Very columnar. Colorful teacher (maestro), too. Thanks for the link.
Mamuang, I definitely plan on getting a scion or two come cutting time.
I was kinda considering adding another pear and thought it might be Harrow Sweet. It says that it is pollinated by Moonglow which I have. (My Kieffer pear is not a Kieffer or at least does not bear Kieffer fruit—fruit looks like Orient. My Orient pear is most likely not an Orient since the bark is much different than the tree that is supposed to be a Kieffer but is bearing Orient type pears. So…who knows if my Moonglow is a Moonglow or something else… does anyone understand that?). So if I think I have a Moonglow to pollinate a Harrow Sweet I may need something else… any suggestions??
Katy
Katy,
How about grafting HS on to your “Moonglow”. You can graft a couple of varieties on it. It’d be all set.
Harrow sweet is a later blooming pear than most at least here in Kansas. My small yellow pear overlaps it’s bloom time.
Well, that might be a solution but the Moonglow and the Unknown pear didn’t even bloom this year so I’m not sure what they are. I take that back. The tree the is supposed to be Moonglow bloomed this fall and set a couple of small pears in late October. So should I wait until I know for sure what they are?
@clarkinks will Moonglow and HS not bloom at the same time?
My moonglow has not bloomed yet so I can’t say for sure but Harrow sweet is very late here. Experts say it can normally be pollinated by Bartlett or Bosc. It does need a pollinator. My Harrow sweet did not bloom with Bartlett this year http://www.growingfruit.org/t/pear-buds-blossoms-and-fruit-2017/9747/2. @mamuang what pear overlapped Harrow sweet at your house?
I only had the one bloom…supposedly Kieffer but the pears from it weren’t Kieffer. Then I have two that did not bloom. Supposedly Orient (suspicious about that) and a supposedly Moonglow (which very well may be Moonglow because someone else reported their Moonglow bloomed and set some fruit this fall and mine did too.). So I only had one pear tree bloom. And it bore pears that looked like Orient and that ripened at about the same time that @Auburn Orient’s ripened. My pear orchard is messed up…they all came from Walmart… I didn’t know better at the time…
Katy,
If you like Asian pear, you could plant an A pear and graft HS on it. My HS is cross pollinated by A pears.
A. pear produces fruit a lot faster than typical E pears. In my experience, they are graft-compatible with E pears.
I’ve never tasted Asian pears. I’m not sure how they would tolerate the climate down here.
You could try something like this one http://www.growingfruit.org/t/anyone-else-trying-charles-harris-asian-pear/10118. As far as bloom time goes I’m not sure how it would do. I started growing it this year. Speak of Asian pear bloom time I think you will find this UC Davis article very interesting Asian Pears - Fruit & Nut Research & Information Center
