Pear identification

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joanne	Pear identification Does anyone know what variety of pear these might be? They are tiny but the tree is laden although they are still not ready I want them to use for chutneys, perry and jam
LynneA	A perry variety?
Green Rosie	I was going to say a perry variety - like this tree I saw on my walk today
Mistress Rose	It could also be an old type. We had one at the end of our garden, but the neighbours between them seem to have done for it. It was very tall and had quite small fruit that I used for cooking.
joanne	I thought it might be a perry variety as well - that's great news because that's what it's mainly going to be used for anyway It is very old, the property is listed and the size of the tree means it must be atleast 100 years old if not more
tahir	We've got a very similar looking pear, label's come off though. We harvested on Staurday, v clean and refreshing taste, v juicy. If I manage to work out what it was I'll let you know
Luath	Could be Black Worcester; an old cooking variety.
joanne	Oooh Luath, I think you might be onto something there. It's definitely similar and definitely a very old variety, more than likely pre-Victorian Does anyone have an email contact for OrangePippin? I wonder if he knows somebody who could identify it properly for us especially if it is a rare heritage variety There are quite a few apple trees as well in the grounds of the house although I think they are quite a bit younger
tahir	OP and his chums are pretty much apple obsessives, I'll skype him and see if he knows anyone
mochyn	I was looking at a tree of Black Worcesters yesterday and the fruit was much bigger than those, Jo.
joanne	I've contacted the Northern Fruit Group and the Heritage Pear project at the Orchard Revival website. There are some apple varieties in the grounds of the house as well as, although I think they may be later but again we've no idea what variety they might be. One's definitely an eater and I think the others are cookers but again we aren't sure what they are. Thanks Tahir - any help would be great especially if it is a 'lost' variety it needs preserving there is also a conference type and two williams type pears
joanne	I was looking at a tree of Black Worcesters yesterday and the fruit was much bigger than those, Jo.

I wonder if they are a relative though, especially as the house is from the 1700's or earlier I think. Christian's sister and her partner renovated it from almost rubble, these are the apple and pears that they managed to save, the gardens were completely overgrown and there were many more fruit trees but alot had to be removed as they were full of disease.

Lorrainelovesplants

Its a perry pear - we also have a massive tree with wooden pears. If you pick them and put by a fruitbowl for a week they soften up, but are never truly nice to eat.

Luath

I was looking at a tree of Black Worcesters yesterday and the fruit was much bigger than those, Jo.

Fruits will diminish in size over a long life time of a fruit tree.

Definitely not medlars, btw. tahir

Jo are they all the same shape (round with a little point?), they are v similar to ours, and we don't have any perry pears.

Either way it's going to be a pre 19th C pear as by then they were much bigger and different shapes

Yes they are all pretty much identical and as the house is from the 1700's it's a very old variety as the tree is huge Nicky cigreen

you could pick a few and see if they ripen up? in my limited experience pears are usually rock hard on the tree joanne

you could pick a few and see if they ripen up? in my limited experience pears are usually rock hard on the tree

That's the plan, however after picking 20lb's of Damsons, 10lb's of the Williams type pears and picking up all the windfall apples we were a bit overwhelmed! So we are going back next week to have a go at the brown ones Smile

joanne

The lovely guy from the Northern Fruit Group came today to look at the trees at Deb's, he's taken cuttings from some of the pears as he couldn't identify them but said the following:

Quote:

Very interesting- one of the two trees nearest to the road (one on its at legs) is a Bramley and the dying one probably the same (shape and size of leaf clue). The two trees near to the house(one leaning over next door hedge!) are Victorian cooker Lane's Prince Albert, raised c 1840- much planted at one time and can keep till March. Both trees had "rootstock" apples as well. From rear garden, have taken pear samples from the pear trees with largish yellow fruits and the dark/red fruits. At this stage not sure about whether the latter is a "rootstock pear ". There may have been a named grafted variety attached at one time; on the other hand we may be able to identify at some stage. Keep tasting the pear to see whether it develops a reasonable flavour! There were 3 trees(one almost dead) in line to the west of our red/purple tree. Two are variety Hessle(Hazel pear) - many of these along Cockerbar Lane- very hardy, allegedly from Yorkshire c 1820, but possibly Scottish in origin. Missed out the Conference pear in front garden- again the rootstock has come through from the base and is producing quite sizeable russet looking pears; they may not be edible!!

The Hessle pear is the one that I thought was a Williams type pear - I find it very interesting that the mystery pear that started all this off is still unidentified. It must be a variety even if it was originally used as a rootstock!

The Lane's Prince Albert apple is a lovely one, makes fantastic juice and a load of it are currently in my cider experiment. I'm going to cook some for the freezer as well

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