Pear, Flowering
Location: east planters of the Kansas Union
Approximate blooming period: early - mid May
Bradford/Callery pear, Pyrus calleryana
Origin: China, Viet Nam, Japan, and Korea
Habitat: Hardy USDA 5&6
Height and Form: Deciduous tree, 30-40 ft (9-12 m)
Foliage and Bark: Leaves are alternate, simple, leathery, and lustrous dark green. Foliage can develop a spectacular reddish-purple in fall. Trunk bark is lightly furrowed and grayish brown at maturity
Flowers, Fruit and Seeds: Flowers white, borne in 7.5 cm clusters (cymes). Fruit small rounded, 10-15 mm across, russet-dotted.
Name: calleryana: after Joseph M. M. Callery (1810-1862), a missionary.
Cultivars/Varieties:
- AristocratTM - leaves narrow, glossy, purple-red to orange fall color. Narrow branch angles, fast growing, pyramidal habit. Susceptible to fireblight, USDA Zone 4b.
- ‘Autumn Blaze’ - horizontal branches from a broad crown. Develops variable fall color early. Reportedly cold hardy to USDA Zone 4. Selected at Oregon State University by Mel Westwood.
- ‘Bradford’ - the original introduction and for sometime the "standard", it has several positive features, for example its flowers appear before leaves emerge and thus more showy than several other cultivars. However, it reportedly has a tendency to split with age (see Dirr, 1998, for a good discussion). It was raised from seed purchased in China in 1919 and named in 1963.
- ‘Capital’ - glossy leaves, forms a narrow crown (columnar), purple-red to bronze fall color, thornless, and fireblight resistant.
- Chanticleer® (syn. ‘Select’, ‘Glen's Form’) - upright, narrow columnar form, but apparently more than one clone since some are more columnar than others, reddish fall color, USDA Zone 4.
- ‘Redspire’ - pyramidal form, symmetrical, formal, fall color yellow to red, reportedly goes dormant earlier in fall.
Common pear, Pyrus communis
Origin: Asia
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