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["H.Dessureault" <inter.verbis@atreide.net>]

Greetings!

Here is a big problem!

I was pruning yesterday when I noticed that a few of my pyrus ussuriensis, some of which are top grafted with different varieties, were growing new shoots along the trunk. The tops are alive and look good and healthy. The trunks (average 2" in diameter) are kind of scaly, but I think they are supposed to look like this. The top branches are smooth and greyish, so are the new shoots along the trunk (some of which are close to a foot in length).

 

This brought me to a halt.

 

I always though that pyrus don't produce adventis shoots, the way malus does. I mean a spontaneous bud, to produce a branch where there was none. There are not too many pear trees growing around here to inspect and I read many times in books that pyrus don't produce spontaneous buds.

 

Then, how come new shoots are coming out of nowhere along the trunk? Up to now, I had only noticed sometimes new shoots coming out from the roots. I have at least three pyrus ussuriensis that sent a few odd shoots out of the side. And I should add that I also noticed a Luscious grafted onto unknown rootstock that has a shoot in the Luscious part of the trunk.

 

(we did have a very rainy season last year...)

 

Question number two.

Two years ago, I budded some Comice material that had been lost in the mail and had taken at least three weeks to reach me. The person who had send the branches had not cut the leaves and when I finally got the material, the buds look pretty dried up. I budded them anyway (chip budding). Some took, at least the wood part, but instead of a bud, in the middle of the wood piece, there is a hollow part where the bud should have been. In other word, I have live Comice wood integrated into the tree, with no buds on it. I have a few of these. After the second winter, the wood still looks good. It's alive and calloused and is part of the tree. I was planning to cut those branches with the chips on them, in a few weeks, and graft some new material of a different variety to replace the unsuccessful budding. Is it worth waiting to give those chips a second chance ....? 

Please give me some advice on this subject.

 

Thank you very much,

Hélène

Zone 3

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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