The best Asian Pears

I’m so excited!!! Thanks for posting that, @Seedy.Looks amazing!

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Also like a lot of other types of fruit trees, one variety of Asian pear might have great fruit in one climate and not in another. That is why when starting out it’s best to try more varieties than you need to feed you, to see what works best in ones own climate. Also like you said they can be picked early, that is why at the grocery store it’s hard to find great tasting Asian pears.

Just harvested the last of my KG’s yesterday on the farm here in PA. Absolutely blown away by the butterscotchiness of this year. Excited for twenty five more Asian Pear trees in Spring, not so much on the workload of planting them :sweat_smile::joy:. Also does anyone know if the Ya white pear and the Ya Li Pear are the same thing? I’m collecting pears at the moment and trying to find the true “white” pear.

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Biggest KG this season, close to 1lb.

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Lots of “Best” Asain pears. They all look great. I know it is all about “location,location,location” with any fruit.
I am in SW Ohio and in between zones either 6a or 5b type weather. What Asian pears has someone grown in these type of zones that are really good ones? I need the ones that are crisp, juicy and have a great flavor to them. I only have space for one Asian pear. I have three European pears along side of the area I have open for an Asian pear. Can the European pears pollinate the Asian pear? Or do I need two Asian pears for pollination?

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Hopefully, someone in your area will chime in.

To me, Asian pears, has similar taste and texture, juicy, crunchy and sweet (some more, some less). Some have tartness to balance the sweetness. Their taste is not complex like Euro pear. I personally think “great flavor” may not be the way to describe Asian pears.

Fire blight is what you have to watch out for. If you can find a fire blight resistant, good tasting A pear for your area, you get a winner. Shinko is one of the blight resistant variety that seems to taste much better inland that along the east coast.

A pears and E. pears cross pollinate one another if their blooms overlap. One A tree is sufficient among your E pears. However, if your E pears are those that take a long time to bloom, you may have a problem. An A. pear blooms in year 3 or 4. Some E pears take 8-10 years to start blooming.

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I’m growing a number of Asian pears in 5b/6a although my area is hotter and drier in the summer. They do well. I have Olympic giant in the middle of a block of Euro pears, and it sets fruit just fine. For me, it has been disease resistant, productive, late season, long keeping. There are some Asian pears that are reported to be self pollinating such as Hosui and 20th Century, but I don’t know about that because mine are not planted in isolation. I’m not sure how disease resistant they would be there if you have fire blight issues. As mamuang said, the differences in taste with them are subtle.

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I have grafted several varieties of Asian pear to friends’’ trees. The pear that they all reported good flavor is the dripping honey

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I’m in S.E Ohio and grow Asian pears. I’ve had good luck with the ones I’ve grown/grafted. I will say they are crisp and JUICY however, not much flavor. Just my take in the S.E.

What particular varieties of Asian pears have you had success with?

Shinseiki, Korean Giant, and 20th Century.

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TY. I will look at each one of those to try here.

@MikeC,
I have all three. Size-wise, KG is the largest. shinseiki is medium/small but still bigger than 20th C.

Taste-wise, I like KG, Shinseiki and 20th in that order.

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TY, that helps out a lot.

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I grow several in NE Ohio. Shinseiki is my all-around favorite but I just grafted Korean Giant last year. Shinseiki quickly turns deeper yellow when ripe, and the fruit will fall off easily when lifted. At this point the are very tasty and juicy. If picked a few days earlier they taste bland. Shinko was bland for me no matter how long I left it on. Chojuro, Kosui, Yongi and Nigiseiki are all good. Asian pears are very easy to graft. Shinseiki is earliest which is nice (late August for me), and I’ve managed to get 14-16 brix on them the last few years.

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Is anyone grafting Asian pears to calleyeranna?

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Does anyone have any extra Asian sionwood to trade… dripping honey Orr late Korean perhaps

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yes, i grafted about 90 calleryana, i.e. wild pear trees last year using Asean pear scion that I bought from Burnt Ridge. about 70% success rate.

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do you have any update on this pear?

I was out at the the govn orchard last week but didn’t even go to the ‘other’ side where there are many non-pear items but is also the home of the Jilin Mkt trees. I was volunteering for an organization and only got a few scions for myself. I don’t know if I’ll be going back there anytime soon, though I may. If I do I’ll try to get some scions from the tree that produced the pear shown. I will try to remember to get an identifier number because I think (but I’m not sure) scions can be ordered from just about anything out there. (NCGR-CORV)