North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Haighal@aol.com]

Monty, you said your Bosc bore fruit the first summer so your trees were apparently already mature when you bought them.  Boscs on anything but quince root-stock take a long time to mature, up to eight years- but if you bought your trees in containers, root constriction may have accelerated the maturation process. 

 

Sometimes a potted tree will fruit the first year in the ground and then the increased access to soil will send it back into a vegetative cycle.  You may need to do some branch spreading to get the trees to settle down.

 

If the bosc pears were very unripe when they dissappeared that first summer the culprits were probably squirrels.  Crows like some sugar but squirrels consistantly strip pears of green fruit, possibly just to ground down their teethe as I've often found the shredded pears under the trees.  The like green peaches almost as much.

 

Alan Haigh  The Home Orchard Company  Carmel, NY 10512

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