Plant · P-372

Asian Pear

Pyrus pyrifolia

Asian Pear bears a crisp, juicy, apple-textured fruit eaten out of hand or baked into pies, and unlike a European pear it has to ripen fully on the tree rather than being picked green. Most varieties won't set fruit alone, so plant at least two, and expect the first harvest around year three or four from a tree that can keep bearing for fifty years or more. It needs only about 400 chill hours over winter and shrugs off up to 1200, tolerates heavy clay and caliche soil without amendment, and carries strong resistance to fire blight, the disease that otherwise keeps commercial pear growing out of many regions.