86 



llie Horticuliurid and Journal 



G-eneral Principles of Pear 

 Crtlture. 



BV S. J. I'AKKEK, M. D. 



NO fruit so constantly maintains as high 

 prices as pears. At first it would seem 

 difficult to account for this. But the quality 

 of a well ripened pear is very high, and the 

 overstocking of the market quite rare. 

 The tree is rather more subject to disease 

 than the apple, but while apples are the 

 great orchard fruit, it is difficult to say 

 why large pear orchards, especially of 

 standards, are compared with apples, so few. 

 Even supposing the estimate of five trees in 

 each hundred to be the annual average loss 

 by pear blight in the United States, it is 

 even then no reason why pears should not 

 be more largely cultivated. But we do not 

 believe that the average pear blight loss for 

 the Middle and Northwestern States is over 

 two trees in each hundred by the blight. 

 We are sure that many a pear orchard does 

 not lose annually an average of one tree. 



Perhaps one reason why more pear trees 

 are not relied on for pecuniary profit is, 

 because of their slow growth. We know of 

 quite a number of orchards that were 

 diligently cultivated for a few years ; then 

 abandoned in disgust ; sold at loss, and 

 neglected for a few years, but now when 

 fifteen or so years of age has been ac- 

 quired, they pay liberally and with relia- 

 ble certainty their present owners. This 

 fact of the necessity of time to mature the 

 tree and bring it into healthful bearing, is 

 an essential to be fully understood before 

 one invests his capital in pears. Such ex- 

 amples as this often occur : Lawyer Sud- 

 den-zeal buys five acres for a pear orchard. 

 He is going to get, in four to five years, 

 Bartletts and Flemish Beauties, and other 

 varieties, worth sixteen dollars a barrel 

 wholesale, and retail prices to match. He 

 plants. Not a weed grows in all the 

 orchard for three years. Then the trees 

 are not much of a sight, nor reliable as he 



supposed, and he tires, and in two years 

 more the orchard is sold, and Lawyer Sud- 

 den-zeal is out of pocket over one thousand 

 dollars. Dr. Hard-bargain buys it next, 

 and means to show Mr. Sudden-zeal that he 

 can get pears. But the Doctor loves to 

 smoke and gossip in his office, and that is 

 not good pear culture ; and he lets the 

 weeds and grass grow wurse than ever. 

 Jim Cash-grab then buys the orchard of the 

 Doctor at a loss of six hundred dollars more. 

 Jim sells all the trees he can at any price, 

 skin-flints the orchard, but fails to do much 

 harm, and at last sells to Mr. Move-west 

 the elephant, openly glorying that he sold 

 a hundred trees at a dollar each, and got 

 out of that bad job, at only a hundred and 

 twenty dollars loss. In the meantime the 

 twelve to fifteen years of age have passed 

 over the trees. 



Mr. Move-out-west is from the East, 

 where labor is not despised. He looks over 

 the forlorn five acres, and concludes that 

 two years hard work will infuse life into the 

 orchard. He replants the spots whence 

 the skin-flint Jim Cash took out trees. 

 He carefully cultivates, and patiently ex- 

 pends one third of all he expects to get 

 each year on the trees, and has a steady 

 annual sale of six to eighteen hundred 

 dollars proflt, out of the very land and trees 

 hitherto so unprofitable, and so often sold 

 by its owners. Such is the private history 

 of many such an attempt. Whence these 

 errors ? and why do these ever present 

 characters of brainless attempt, supposed good 

 luck and sharpness, cash-grab, and in the 

 end successful thrift, follow in regular 

 succession ? Ts it not because the real 

 work, the long time, the clearly foreseen 

 final result is not understood ? 



Again. As countries grow older, the 

 apple ceases to command high prices as 

 compared with the pear. We do not think 

 this always just or desirable. Yet, if- wc 

 read the history of the culture of each, 

 rightly, this is often the case. Of the 

 reasons for it, I will name but one. The 

 original scattered population of New Eng- 



