North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Kieran and/or Donna" <holycow@frontiernet.net>]

http://www2.bioversityinternational.org/publications/Web_version/156/ch2.htm


This might help us to describe pears better to each other, but it also has 
some real information in it.  Magness is listed as not at all precocious, 
which is it's reputation, but when they get to "yields per unit of land" 
they list Magness as very low "cropping efficiency".  Well, I know how some 
of these evaluations get done, and any tree that doesn't crop for 7 years 
isn't going to come off very well compared to Kieffer and Bartlett, no 
matter how well it does for you in your backyard after those 7 long years 
are done.  The 4 years it does nothing get counted against it in the 
official evalutations.  Also, I recently heard that Magness and Warren are 
tip bearers, something I could have stood to have known a few years back and 
maybe I'd have the tree in a better shape to reach those tips.  Chris 
Inhulsen's Warrens and Magness trees are really nice spreading trees.  The 
crotch angles are practically flat which is a nice change from most pears. 
Having gotten my first crop of Warrens last year, I wish I'd planted my tree 
in a really good spot and taken good care of it.  The 15   years it took to 
crop (par for the course for Warren on anything but quince stock I hear) 
could have been shortened if I'd started ringing the trunk or branches age 
5-6 instead of waiting till it was about 13.  The fruit I got off that tree 
last year was incomparable.  Yes, Ayers is very very good, but Warren is 
even better.  And Magness is so similar, Chris can't tell them apart.  One 
person told me that there is a slight difference in the trees.  I think 
Magness has a better reputation for merely tardy cropping, instead of being 
some sort of torture device for fruit fanatics.  If you have Warren on a 
standard rootstock, better start doing unto it before it does unto you. 
Beating with chains is recommended for walnuts and tardy apples, and maybe 
safer from the aspect of fireblight than ringing.  I didn't do any serious 
ringing, Just drew a knife around the trunk a few times.  You can still the 
the scar, which means I did a pretty good job of slowing the sap flow. 
Would someone try the neat trick of taking a ring of bark off and putting it 
on upside down?  I hadn't thought of that one, sounds like a fun way to kick 
these 2 varieties into bearing.  The Comice parent is responsible for the 
problem, I read it typically takes 12 years to crop.  That's one reason the 
fruit is rare and expensive, but it's also said to be picky about climate. 
Warren and Magness don't seem to have that reputation, but I think too few 
people have bearing trees yet to comment.       Donna