Why I Oughta...

Our little 'pear tree that could' is back this year with a plentiful bounty on it's limbs.  Here's a look at just some of the fruit that is hanging pretty low.  The branches are droopy with the weight of fruit clinging to them. Last year, I didn't post any shots of the tree or the pears because I *think* it didn't produce anything?  Do pear trees take the occasional year off?  Those of you who have been following along for a while might remember that this is the same tree that snapped in half back in a big storm in 2010.   Check out this photo showing how skinny it was and how it - at basically chest height - snapped the top off . And now it is this big, healthy, vibrant tree!  Pretty cool to see it come back to life.  Here's what the tree looks like today: Here's a post with a photo of the tree from 2013 .    Not sure how much it has grown, but it is filled out a bit.  Hopefully the tree will pay dividends for some new folk...

Just two months after I noticed that the pear tree in our backyard had gone through a growth spurt, we're dealing with our first *real* pear harvest.   With a little bit of reading, turns out you're not supposed to allow pears to ripen on the tree .  I pulled down as many as I could, but I need to get on a ladder this weekend to remove the rest. From the fine folks at Oregon State University : Pears picked when slightly immature will ripen with better quality than pears that are over mature when picked. To tell if a pear is mature, a general rule of thumb is that, while still on the tree, most mature, ready to ripen pears will usually detach when "tilted" to a horizontal position from their usual vertical hanging position. Bosc pears always are difficult to separate from the spur.  "Unlike apples, which are ready to eat from the day they are picked, pears must go through a series of changes before they can deliver their full splendor," explained Sugar...

Back in June of 2010, our little pear tree snapped in half during a big storm.   Here's the sad photo of it being cracked off at about 4 feet tall.  I didn't have much hope for it to survive, but we left it in the ground. By September of 2010, the tree showed some life and started to have shoots coming off the cracked trunk.   Photos of that growth here . This year?  Well...it hasn't stopped and now is in the running for the tallest tree in our backyard.  Here is how it looked this morning. And the pears?  They're starting to come in. Come September, I'm thinking we'll have some fruit to pick.