What pears will hou grow in 2020? One thing ive noticed is many new pear growers have a wonderful selection of fast producing types of pears like Duchess d’ Angoulme, Douglas, harrow sweet, and harrow delight that provide pears at different times of the year. Most of those mentioned produce pears in just 2-3 years!
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I’ve got a “Rescue” pear I hope to plant in a permanent location. That will be it, unless I get some scions and try converting some volunteer callery pear seedlings into fruiting trees.
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Harrow Sweet got shaded this year, its first year. I hope I didn’t runt it out. It’s on Pyro 2-33.
I put in a Spring 2020 order with Cummins for Aurora, Magness, and Olympic/Korean Giant. Cummins told me the Euros actually won’t pollinate the KG, so I guess I’ll be looking to get Drippin’ Honey scion next winter.
After the house gets painted the top outdoor “project” will be to remove more of that monstrosity of a hemlock hedge the previous owner of the house left. Not just for the HS, but the spot I have in mind for the new pears is right where some of the hedge is currently standing.
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@BlueBerry
Please let us know if you need scionwood for your project. Converting callery over to fruiting pears seems like a great way to make a nice orchard. What varities do you actually want to have?
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@Joe
Harrow sweet stays very small as it is. Pyro just didnt have the root system needed for Kansas but i did try it. @lordkiwi sent me some excellent pyro rootstocks but ive concluded in Kansas we need to stick to callery, bet , or ohxf rootstock. With trees like harrow delight and more so harrow sweet tbey can even runt out callery.
It might have been a mistake, but a description I read said it was well-anchored that the size would only be slightly smaller than OHxF 87. I figured I’d try it.
The tree is really ridiculously shaded and put on very little growth as a result this year. I’ll give it one year with some actual sun before giving up on it and replacing it with a tree on OHxF 87.
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@Joe
Everyone else i think had good luck with pyro roostocks. Here in Kansas BET is really good and Callery because our soil is not the best and the environment can be dicey also. Kansas is likely the most difficult place short of Colorado or Nebraska to grow fruit. Harrow sweet like honesweet, seckle and others is just not an aggresive growing pear. Combine shade and other adverse conditions with that type of tree it can be difficult to get them established.
Mine was really, really shaded. I just never got around to cutting enough of the hemlock hedge this summer. The branches it put on the whip are no more than a few inches. Would you think it’s going to be runted out after this, or should I give it a chance? Now I’m starting to feel tempted to just add a Harrow Sweet on OHxF 87 to my Cummins order and dig this one out, and maybe plant it somewhere else.
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It will be ok if you dont let it fruit by keeping the flowers plucked off and keep everything else shading it off of it. When you prune it dont prune the main leader rather let it grow straight up for awhile.
I’m planning to let it go a bit higher. I’m not sure if it’d get big enough so that the scaffolds can start around the 6’ mark, but that seems to be the general consensus here for keeping the fruit too high for the deer to reach it.
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In my area the deer stand on their hind legs reaching up 8’ or 9’ easily using a hopping technique. You might need to fence them out. I came up on 3 of them picking pears like that once and i got quite a chuckle out of it. The pear trees are around 30’ down at the pond where they were.
Or pray they don’t make a habit of going that way. Right now, they go to the other side of the yard until sometime in October when all their food dies out. I have two vegetable gardens. One that I need to protect with ropes all season, the other that I can just leave unprotected from deer.
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Check your order status on Cummins webpage. My Korean Giant order got switched from ohxf 97 to BET without them telling me. When I asked about it, apparently all their Asian pear grafts failed on ohxf 97 this year, so they ordered all their Asian pear bare roots from a local nursery to fulfill their spring 2020 orders. I personally don’t mind this except a little heads-up would have been nice plus I’ve had lower success with BET on my soil.
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@Martin
BET grow really good here but its imperative that we keep any suckers removed. The scion can barely keep up with those aggressive growing roots!
Interesting, as my three young Asian pear trees died last (mild) winter on OHxF 87. I’m suspicious that they aren’t really happy on that rootstock, at least here in the north, although I see some of you folks having good luck with it. Or maybe Asian pears just aren’t nearly as hardy as the European pears. I’m hoping to try them again on Harbin rootstock, if I can get some.
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When I first checked there were no KG in stock at all, BET was the only option I saw when it came in stock several days later. Thanks though.
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I have no idea what grows well in Alaska. But the ohxf rootstocks handle the heat and clay soil well in California with the benefit of fireblight resistance. Almost all the local nurseries here grow pears in ohxf 333 but it’s a bit too dwarfing with the precocious varieties.
Answering the OP, I ordered harrow delight and KG from raintree for spring 2020.
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@Palmer
Yes harbin are the best rootstock for Alaska due to cold tolerance. Here is where you get them
http://willamettenurseries.com/fruit-tree-seedlings/pears/harbin-pear
They sell other rootstocks for those who want bartlett, BET, or callery FRUIT TREE SEEDLINGS | Willamette Nurseries rootstock clonal seedling fruit tree ornamental seedlings
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Can I think on that a bit before I commit? (You have a list posted anywhere?)
Bartlett, Keiffer, Ayers and Rescue I have.
(Be tickled to accept some, and pay the freight though.)
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Thanks, Clark. Harbin is harder to find. My Asian pears died, but the 87 rootstock all survived fine, so I re-grafted some European pear varieties on those roots. Most of the European pears I had wintered well on the 87. We’ll see how that goes in the long run.
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