Red fleshed pears

I just this year grafted Joeys red fleshed. In the past i have grafted red fleshed pears but had 100% losses due to storms, drought etc… per corvallis
http://www.ars-grin.gov/cor/catalogs/pyrredflesh.html
Joeys red fleshed
" Narrative

Scions received in 1992 from Clarence Barker, then of Albany, Oregon. Mr. Barker had obtained this cultivar from his nephew Joey. The original tree was in a 100 year old orchard on Joey’s Farm in McGraw, New York. The fruit ripens in the fall, unlike other NCGR red flesh pears which all ripen in the summer. This may be the old German ‘Blutbirne’."

’Rotkottig frau Ostergotland’
"
Narrative

Red-fleshed cultivar

Source History

  • Accession was developed. Sweden

  • Accession was donated. 24-Mar-1981. Maryland United States

Donors:

  1. Waterworth, Howard, USDA, ARS
    Comment: Received from Bandholm, Denmark to Glenn Dale, Maryland to NCGR-Corvallis
  • Accession was donated. 21-Feb-1981. Oregon United States

Donors:

  1. Lombard, Porter, Oregon State University
    Comment: Received from Bandholm, Denmark to Glenn Dale, Maryland to NCGR-Corvallis
  • Accession was donated. 27-Nov-1987. Oregon United States

Donors:

  1. Postman, Joseph, USDA-ARS
    Comment: Received from Bandholm, Denmark to Glenn Dale, Maryland to NCGR-Corvallis
  • Accession was donated. 07-Dec-2007. Oregon United States

Comment: Harvested 07/27/2007"
Sanguinole
"
Narrative

Description: Red flesh is the main characteristic of Sanguinole. It was first known in Germany in 1500 but was imported to France from Switzerland. The fruits are below medium or small in size. They vary in form, ranging from turbinate-obtuse, or globular, to bossed. The skin is thick and rough, green dotted with gray and red, sprinkled with streaks and patches of russet. The flesh is transparent, red, semi-fine, semi-breaking, juicy, saccharine, acidulous, somewhat musky, and agreeable; but decomposes fast."

Summer Blood Birne’

  • Accession was developed. Germany

  • Accession was donated. 24-Mar-1981. Maryland United States

Donors:

  1. Waterworth, Howard, USDA, ARS
    Comment: Received from Skierniewice, Poland to Glenn Dale, Maryland to NCGR-Corvallis"

Verbelu

  • Accession was developed. Poland

  • Accession was donated. 24-Mar-1981. Maryland United States

Donors:

  1. Waterworth, Howard, USDA, ARS
    Comment: Received from source in Budapest to Glenn Dale PIO to NCGR-Corvallis
  • Accession was donated. 06-Feb-2003. Texas United States

Donors:

  1. Natelson, Ethan A.,"
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@mamuang that link is working for me in the old post
The joey red flesh are growing like a weed using harrow delight as an interstem on callery. Two reasons i grafted to harrow delight #1 harrow delight produces quickly which should make joeys red flesh produce quickly #2 harrow delight grafts easier or as easy as ohxf rootstock because it was crossed with rootstock in the first place ( (old home x early sweet) x bartlett) Harrow Delight Pear

Clark,
To me, the Swedish frau pear is the interesting one because there is no account what it tastes like. I hope it is good.

The German pears do not sound appealing to me so far.

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@mamuang Time will tell but i’m told joeys red flesh is one of the best flavored red fleshed pears.

Frequently links change so i want to update this with types of red fleshed pears from ars grin.
All information below is from the following link https://npgsweb.ars-grin.gov/gringlobal/accessiondetail.aspx?id=1020885
Joey’s Red Flesh Pear’- Scions received in 1992 from Clarence Barker, then of Albany, Oregon. Mr. Barker had obtained this cultivar from his nephew Joey. The original tree was in a 100 year old orchard on Joey’s Farm in McGraw, New York. The fruit ripens in the fall, unlike other NCGR red flesh pears which all ripen in the summer. This may be the old German ‘Blutbirne’.



Rotkottig frau Ostergotland’-Accession was developed in Sweden
sectionedfruit01
Sanguinole-Description: Red flesh is the main characteristic of Sanguinole. It was first known in Germany in 1500 but was imported to France from Switzerland. The fruits are below medium or small in size. They vary in form, ranging from turbinate-obtuse, or globular, to bossed. The skin is thick and rough, green dotted with gray and red, sprinkled with streaks and patches of russet. The flesh is transparent, red, semi-fine, semi-breaking, juicy, saccharine, acidulous, somewhat musky, and agreeable; but decomposes fast. From Germany where it was developed in 1500
naturalfruit01

Summer Blood Birne- developed in Germany


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Red fleshed pears are all but gone in the world with maybe 6 remaining known varities easily available to us in the USA. There are others that may be in the country by some other means. It was rumored Nick Botners collection had more pears and his preserved collection now is rumored to have more. Thankfully we have the USDA program in corvallis making red fleshed pears easily available NCGR-Corvallis: Pyrus Catalog . At this point I want to bring up the Etter apple collection and continued work I see @SkillCult and others doing to diversify the red fleshed apple collection. The problem has became that the genetic diversity is becoming very limited among red fleshed varities of apples and pears. @SkillCult it appears is trying to finish some of Etters work with red fleshed apples. I’m an admirer of his work and I understand his motivations. Breeding a red fleshed apple like the type he has in mind is no small task. Etter died before he could greatly improve the red fleshed apple. What’s even worse many say 90% or more of his work was lost. The knowledge and genetic diversity that was lost through the years is staggering. We have lost thousands of varities of apples and pears forever. I assure you my plan is to do some work on red fleshed pears. When I say red fleshed varities are easily available I mean obtainable not truly easy. This is what the website looks like today. Remember the site link changes frequently. Many of you know or know of Dr. Natelson of Texas who sent in Joeys red fleshed pear and many others to Corvalis to preserve them.

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I’m glad to see an interest in RF pears. I didn’t know they existed until I got a stick of Joey’s Red Flesh from somebody some years back. I have not been able to fruit it yet. I got some RF and other pear scions this year from Chris Homanics, via the Corvallis collection. That I have not dug through and grafted yet. From the looks of those photos, I’m imagining they are pretty primitive in general and ripe for improvement. It seems to me that there is a golden opportunity to pursue improved RF pears. I doubt it will take that many generations before something reasonably good is brought forth as long as the second parents are of good qualities. Also much faster if it is along the lines of a group effort, as sharing pollen and seeds early could potentially shave off many years and bring new breeders or participant/selectors in without having to start making first generation crosses from scratch. Pears would probably be second on my list to breed if I wasn’t already too busy with apples. I hope a bunch of people take up the challenge.

And just a word for pears in general. They have really fallen out of public favor I think, because they are not all that well suited by nature to the current industrial food model. They can’t be picked ripe and have to make it through a gauntlet of potential problems to end up ripening well on our counters. Then they still have to be eaten at just the right time. But a well ripened chilled pear is to me an extraordinary dessert fruit, and should be more popular, as they were in the old days. I doubt they have ever rivaled apples in temperate areas for king of homestead fruits for diverse use and quantity (well, maybe somewhere?) but they certainly were more popular and a lot of amateur efforts were made toward their improvement, promotion and propagation. It would be great to see a pear renaissance like the current apple renaissance.

I’m particularly enthused about Passe Crassane right now and would definitely pursue breeding with it, and may very well not be able to restrain myself :wink: I had fruits last into March this year with no particular care and pretty widely fluctuating temps. When it ripens, it ripens without much in the way of browning and rot in the core, so it can be gotten very ripe. Flavor is something like vanilla and bourbon, very rich and delicious, especially in February! It can be ripened with warmth as needed. Skin is odd, grainy and crunchy, but breaks apart into tiny bits very easily. I’m looking for more keeping pears like this if anyone has suggestions. In the meantime, Passe Crassane is a real winner for practical use and quality. If I were to pursue an RF pear I would probably start straight off with the latest keeping pears like that.

Either way, taking lessons learned from apple breeding, I would probably pick a goal or two from the start, like late keeping RF or high quality, early, fireblight resistant RF and aim to make crosses with the best non RF parents, preferably using multiple RF parents. I’d graft at least 100 or more pears to assess as potential breeding stock for the stable. That might sound intimidating, but a medium sized frankenpear can hold that many or more. And sadly, I just realized that is what I’m about to start doing this year :cry: :pear:

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@SkillCult a close friend of mine owns the @39thparallel orchard. He has some unique varities of apples you might like and @chartman has some wild apples in his area (including red fleshed types) I think you might be very interested in. Chris has not been on the fruit growing forum lately but he is around. I bring this up because in general I care about fruit growing. I like what your doing with red fleshed apples very much. If your project goes well the next generation may have 50+ types of new red fleshed apples to chose from that actually taste good. I have bred several types of seedling apples over the years and give the scion wood away for others on this forum to grow. I’m focused only on specifically pears that can be grown in Kansas. Fruit growing fell out of favor in Kansas mostly because people don’t have good luck with it. What they do here with row crop farming causes mass erosion. Pears can even be grown spray free here. I have plenty of land already so I don’t need to buy that to grow pears and have experimented with those for many years. My apple breeding project was just an extra project for me Seedling Apples for cider I noticed Chartmans apples were much lighter pink colored. I had a theory since I grow an aronia orchard that maybe the darker color of red causes some bitterness. When I asked Chris about his pink apples he mentioned they tasted good like any apple but not noticeably different. I grow prairie spy apples and see pink veins occasionally in them. Much to my surprise when We cook them they all turn red. They are a very good tasting apple. @chartman
Was also running this website https://smarthunters.proboards.com/ . @derekamills also has many red flesh types of apples and pears he sells if additional materials are needed. I think everyone likes what your doing with the red fleshed apples. I’m waiting to see all the results next time.

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I actually have not sought out a lot of red fleshed cultivars oddly enough. I have mostly just used a few etters and the rather primitive maypole. But I’ve got more new ones in the last few years and a lot this year. Most seem to have issues of some kind and many are very primitive crabs that will likely require many generations to come around, though that is really just an educated guess. I have a feeling I can do okay for quite a while just recycling the etter genes, but in the long run, it seems beneficial and prudent to diversify, even if many have the same genetic ancestors far enough back. I have lots of new seedling apples flowering this year! Hoping for some good new varieties and always more improved new breeding stock to move forward with. I think it’s going to be an exciting year. I have to hand pollinate though until the bees are finished with the arbutus flowers. They are completely ignoring the apples!

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One trick some do is tie something in the tree like old food to attract flies as pollinators. You see that done with pawpaw sometimes. Looking forward to seeing your results. I know your busy but if you can post some of your results on here from your experiments. By the way @39thparallel grows an apple called red cinnamon that reportedly tastes much like cinnamon. I was thinking maybe you could bring a cross like that into the red fleshed apples. It’s white fleshed but I think if I tasted a red fleshed apple that was a strong cinnamon flavor it might grab my attention.

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The bees have got on the apples now, though there aren’t a lot yet. They’re staying busy with oak and madrone trees apparently. I’d love to try out a cinnamon flavored apple. I’m always interested in intense and unique flavors.

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@39thparallel

If you have extra scion or a red cinnamon tree can you send it to @SkillCult ? i will pay for it. I understand if your out.

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sure, PM me the address. I will send it out Monday

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@SkillCult

Lets us know how things go.

Wow, thanks to both of you. I’ll look forward to trying that. I was already thinking about what to cross it with :slight_smile:

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No worries please let us know how it goes. Many of us like to grow fruit just like yourself. Many forum members sent me scions through the years as did the usda. I pay it forward. If we leave behind better fruits and more of them with better genetics perhaps like Etter a few of them will still be around in 100 years. It’s not easy or fast to make new varities. There is no better feeling in the world than to grow fruit and walk amongst your orchard. Pears are primarily what i focus on and red fleshed pears and apples are the rarest of them all.

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I just got my first varieties of red flesh pears: :grin:

Lubenicarka red flesh pear
Sanguinole red flesh pear

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[quote=“SkillCult, post:27, topic:2833”]
*I’m particularly enthused about Passe Crassane right now and would definitely pursue breeding with it, and may very well not be able to restrain myself :wink: I had fruits last into March this year with no particular care and pretty widely fluctuating temps. When it ripens, it ripens without much in the way of browning and rot in the core, so it can be gotten very ripe. Flavor is something like vanilla and bourbon, very rich and delicious, especially in February! … I’m looking for more keeping pears like this if anyone has suggestions.

IMG_0666
Your description of “vanilla + bourbon” came to mind when I brought home and tasted a table-ripened Concorde pear grown at Western Washington Research Station. The best I’ve tasted, even better than Comice!
Info about Concorde from WSU:

Concorde

Harvest Time: Winter Pear
Harvest Time: Fall
Parentage: Conference x Comice
Origin City or State: England
Origin Country: UK
Appearance: bell shaped with long neck; green, sometimes with golden brown russetting, turns yellow upon ripening
Flavor Profile: sweet, vanilla-like flavor, crisp, dense texture becoming more tender and juicy upon ripening
Storage Duration: 5 Months

(The one ‘con’ side is that in 2008 eastern Washington had severe fireblight on their Concorde pears. I plan on grafting Concorde onto my established pears - I have not seen fireblight here in milder western Washington.)

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@cdamarjian

Are you growing conference as well. Concord and comice do not grow particularly fast for me but I do grow them here on multi graft trees. Passe Crassane is notoriously difficult to grow in fireblight prone areas.

@SkillCult

How did your year growing fruit go?

Yes I have Conference - no scab, no apple maggot, and great producer. But too crisp for me…I like the melting Comice taste, but Comice is a scab magnet for me. I picked up Taylor’s Gold and Concorde scions from local extension service. They are both melting and do well here.

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