Asian Pear
Pyrus pyrifolia
Asks for shelter and steady summer water — and close watching for fire blight.
- Type
- Fruit · Perennial
- Botanical family
- Mixed / other
- Foliage color
- Green
- Flower color
- Yellow
- Sunlight
- Full sun, in a sheltered spot so the early blossom comes through unharmed.
- Watering
- Water steadily while the fruit swells, and do not let it run dry.
- Feeding
- A balanced feed in spring; too much nitrogen does more harm than good.
- Frost tolerant
- Yes
- Flowering
- April
- Pruning
- Prune in winter, and thin the fruitlets to 1-2 per spur.
- Mar–Apr Bud Break
- Apr–May Flowering
- May–Aug Fruit Set
- Aug–Sep Harvest
- Sep–Oct Growing
- Oct–Dec Leaf Fall
- Jan–Mar Leaf Fall
- Plant spacing
- 13 ft 1 in
- In-row spacing
- 13 ft 1 in
- Between rows
- 16 ft 5 in
- Square-foot density
- Not suited to SFG
- Root system
- Woody, shallow and far-reaching
- Working depth
- 12–24 in
- Can reach
- 4 ft down where the soil allows
- Spread
- 26–39 ft across, about 2–3× the width of the plant
Almost all of a tree’s roots are in the top two feet of soil, where the air is, and they run out well past the branch tips. The deep taproot most people picture belongs to the seedling; the tree grows out of it and spends the rest of its life spreading sideways instead.
The habit is Asian Pear’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.
Beneficial predators that hunt this plant's pests — grow their favourite flowers nearby to recruit them. companion plant
- Bats ChiropteraHunts Codling moth
A single bat takes hundreds of moths and mosquitoes in a night, and the moths are the parents of your cutworms, corn earworms and hornworms. Put up a bat box on a warm south wall, leave a night-scented corner unlit, and never spray after dark.
- Parasitic wasps Braconidae & TrichogrammaHunts Codling moth
Tiny, stingless wasps that lay eggs in or on caterpillars, aphids, and moth eggs — the white cocoons riding a hornworm are their calling card, so leave that caterpillar be. Umbel flowers with shallow nectar keep the adults fuelled.
Clover, Nasturtiums, Borage, Chives
The Cottage Garden Companion — the gardener's herbarium at cottagegardencompanion.com