Looking for the right pear tree. Any idea?

[4390evans]

I'm being treated to a nice pear tree so I want to get the right one, as I'm very particular with pears haha

I think its the pear in the pic below that I like, I know stores sell them and they are usually a yellow skin with a hint of green and you eat them when they are going soft, they are very juicy more or less mush inside does anyone know what it is?




Also any advice on growing pears would be great

Thanks guys

[Guest]

I only know supermarkets to recognise three varieties as a rule - conference, concorde and Williams bon cretien the latter being the closest to what you describe. If you want to be sure just check the packaging next time you buy some. They often state the variety,

[4390evans]

can Williams bon cretien be grown in the uk?

[FB.]

can Williams bon cretien be grown in the uk?

Yes. Warmer is better but in cooler areas Wiliams can be satisfactory against a sunny wall.

A big problem with pears is pollination. Pears are less common so pollinators aren't always nearby. Pears flower early so there may not be many pollinating insects around - and pear blossom isn't high up the preference list of pollinating insects who only tend to visit pears if they can't find anything else.

In recent years, lack of bees has caused my pears to stop cropping. This year, despite thousands of blossoms I have precisely zero fruit from seven or eight bushes or small trees all different varieties which have good overlap of their flowering.
Lack of bees means, for me, pears are now barely worth growing and mine may well be replaced by more apples in the next couple of years.

[FB.]

Worth mentioning that although my pears have stopped cropping, a couple of nearby people have a decent crop on their mature Conference half-standard trees (I think on seedling pear rootstock planted as specimen trees on front lawns when houses were built), although every fruit is shaped like a banana (long, bent) which is what happens when Conference is poorly pollinated.
I'm fairly sure that not only is Conference self-fertile, but I think it will also produce a crop of these mis-shapen fruit without any pollination - known as 'parthenocarpic'.