Pears
European Pears | Notes on "Nashi"  (Asian pears) | Asian Pears | Pear Rootstocks | Perry pears

NOTES ON ASIAN PEARS (=Nashi)

Apple-Pears, some folks call them, or Pear-Apples;  some say Salad Pears, because some varieties blend so nicely into salads.  Asian pears make up a unique group, really quite unlike either apples or European pears.  Many of them are shaped like apples;  at first glance, Chojuro might masquerade as a Golden Russet apple.  Asian pears are typically very crisp, very juicy, very sweet, and very low acid.  Most Nashi reach peak flavor ripened on the tree; even with prolonged storage, they do not attain the buttery texture of many European pears.

Hosui fruits have very high sugar, usually over 14 Brix, and often will weigh more than 10 ounces.  Niitaka fruits are also large and sweet, with a basically bland flavor.  Shinko  is very productive, perhaps too much so;  it must be thinned early to get good size.  Flavor is perhaps the richest of the nashi.  Shinseiki is one of the most attractive Asian pears -- a typical salad pear.  Twentieth Century is the old standby, the foundation variety.  Skin is smooth, a greenish brown; sweet, bland.  We've no experience yet with Kikusui.   Ya Li is a Chinese variety, rather than Japanese.  Ya Li is pear-shaped, large, somewhat coarse in appearance.  Ya Li has a very low chilling requirement and blooms earlier than the Japanese varieties.

Grafted on Pyrus betulifolia, the Asian pears make vigorous trees but typically of semidwarf stature;  production is usually excellent with outstanding fruit size.  On OHxF 97, a vigorous P. communis  selection,  Asian pears are of somewhat less than standard vigor, making trees similar in size to apples grafted on Malling 7.  Asian pears on OHxF 513 make intermediate-sized trees.  On OHxF 333, which is semi-vigorous with European pear varieties, Asian pears make  dwarfed trees that may be excessively productive and therefore difficult to get premium fruit size.

Fire blight susceptibility is quite variable.  Shinko and Olympic are relatively tolerant; Niitaka and Meigetsu moderately tolerant; Shinseiki intermediate; and Twentieth Century and Hosui susceptible.  In a test block on Red Jacket Orchards here at Geneva, in 2006 Hosui was almost wiped out, Shinsui and Shinseiki were hit hard, and Olympic and Shinko were almost untouched.  As the trees begin to settle down into steady production, though, blight tolerance seems to increase substantially.  One rule of thumb is that if trees get past the first 4 or 5 years in the orchard, they are not likely to be hard hit by blight.

Asian pears offer an exciting opportunity for the fruit grower with a local clientele to diversify, and the home fruit gardener has a new taste treat waiting.  We expect to be extending our list of varieties.

Prices & Salesroom | Top of Page