@Fusion_power
It wasn’t my intention to make this the advanced pear orchard planning thread by leaving out spacing. lol since i skipped the obvious spacing criteria i will post some older related threads. Lets go back a few posts and sometimes several years
Wanted to post a couple of pictures discussing how much easier it is to plant trees on a larger scale. Typically nurseries that ship commercially grow trees of equal height, trim roots, scale by size etc. you get good quality trees. The trees below came from lawyer nursery. These beautifolia pear rootstocks are ideal for Asian pears [image] [image] [image]
This is one bundle of a hundred and there are a still a couple of more bundles of a hundred each in the refrigerator. I wont worry about gr…
The good soil and best farms are taken so where does the person just starting out buy their farm when the good land is gone and very expensive to get? The secret is in the rootstocks. As many of you know this is my long term belief to adapt plants to live on marginal property. I believe in 100% self sufficiency. Callery rootstocks adapt which is thought to be bad but its not its actually very good. They are only bad in areas where they are an invasive. Imagine you can afford to buy land that…
Most of us know callery pear can be problematic is certain areas for the same reasons I like them. They grow where other trees will not, they can survive both drought and heavy rains. Digging up the wild rootstocks is a bit of a pain but if your like me and have an area you have problems growing pears and they are not invasive in your state you might try them. These a friend and I dug up the other day are going into wet heavy clay that a domestic pear will not grow in. Fortunately I had my frien…
Which of these pear semi-dwarf rootstocks are best for early bearing, productivity, and toleration of wet, clay soil (growing zone 7a, Tenn.)??
OHxF87 vs. OHxF333 vs. Quince A
Thanks for your collective wisdom from experience!
After growing hundreds of pear trees and considering drought, heavy rains, extreme heat and cold, poor soil drainage and fertility , alkaline soil, heavy winds etc. I find my favorite rootstocks still to be Pyrus betulifolia aka BET and callery. I typically get both types from Williamette Nursery. Old home crosses are very good rootstocks but i find them slightly less desirable for me but those or quince are great for dwarfing and in many locations where the pears i mentioned are prone to be…
My new orchard is a couple of acres of BET and callery rootstocks with a few ohxf333 and ohxf97 mixed in where others died. This is one of my largest projects yet. It’s adjacent to my aronia field. The pears are very hard to see since they have dropped leaves and the photos were taken just before the snow arrived. Be ready to see hundreds of more varities in coming years. The information is so hard to find now about pears we almost have to grow them to know anything about them. All these hun…
Everyone seems to be against growing full size pear trees. I need to ask why aside from the obvious reasons of being hard to pick , hard to spray, and taking longer to produce? I see a lot of advantages such as more pears, more scion wood, more fruit less space, to much for any person or animal to steal all of them at one time, enough to share etc… What are your thoughts? I love full sized trees.
@fruitnut
When i view things in a certain way it is based on my own personal experience as related to my orchard or those nearby. You are no doubt correct overall for many people. In California, all they plant usually are dwarfs. In my soil trees are very slow to come into production at times in addition to other things stated. Planting an orchard is a lot of work which i only want to do once. Naturally i respect your opinion as well. Short lived trees are a very poor choice for me. Dont …
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