PYRONIA 
A Hybrid Between the Pear and Quince—Produces Abundance of Seedless 
Fruit of Some Value—Many New Combinations Might be Made 
Among the Relatives of the Pear 
Dr. L. TRABUT 
Botanist of the Government of Algeria, Algiers 
ARLY in 1913, Mr. Veitch, of 
kK London, sent me some cions of a 
hybrid he had recently obtained 
between Pyrus and Cydonia. 
He called this interesting creation 
Pyronia, and asked me to study it 
under the more favorable climatic 
conditions of our region. Since this 
new plant had proved to be an attractive 
ornamental shrub in the climate of 
London, I thought that in Algeria the 
fruits might be comestible, and Pyronia 
might become one of our cultivated 
orchard trees. The cions received were 
therefore grafted on well-grown stocks 
of a Moroccan pear recently described! 
(Pyrus gharbiana Trabut), which were 
growing in poor soil at the Botanic 
Station. 
In November of the same year the 
cions had made a growth to 2 meters, 
and were as large as one’s thumb at the 
base. In 1914 the first fruits appeared 
on variety A. 
In the spring of 1915 they flowered 
abundantly and set a large quantity of 
fruit. The observations here described 
will deal only with the variety A, to 
which [ have given the name X Cydonia 
Veitch var. John Seden. It may be 
described as follows: 
A vigorous tree resembling the quince, 
the wood brown with numerous lenticels. 
Leaves light green, the vernation very 
peculiar; one side of the leaf blade is 
inrolled, as in the pear, the other side, 
in place of being inrolled symmetrically, 
encircles the first so perfectly that the 
vernation may be called convolute. 
It is therefore intermediate between the 
conduplicate vernation of Cydonia and 
the involute vernation of Pyrus. Leaf- 
blades elliptic, entire, villous when 
young though very sparsely so on the 
principal veins and the petiole, the 
venation irregular; petioles one-third 
to one-fourth as long as the blades. 
Stipules inserted at the base of the 
petiole, villous, on vigorous shoots 
attaining a length equaling that of the 
petioles. The leaves adjacent to the 
flowers which appear in the first flower- 
ing period are larger than the normal 
ones, and less attenuate at both ends. 
The flowers are produced in clusters of 
three at the ends of the branchlets, each 
group arising from a cluster of large 
leaves arranged in a rosette. The 
pedicel bears two bracteoles near its 
base, one sometimes a third of the way 
up the pedicel. Calyx, with five deltoid 
lobes slightly incurved, pilose on both 
surfaces but more heavily so outside, 
the margins glandular-toothed. Corolla 
large, 5 cm. broad, aestivation quincun- 
cial, the petals suborbicular, distinctly 
clawed, quite glabrous, white, tinged 
with rose, especially before anthesis. 
Stamens twenty, the filaments nearly 
erect in the ten alternating with the 
petals, curving in the others. Anthers 
violet, 3 mm. long, the pollen normal 
in appearance. Styles five, free, the 
ovary with five locules each containing 
two superposed series of three ovules. 
The fruits are, abundant, developing 
from nearly every flower, hence they 
are grouped in threes at the ends of the 
branchlets. A second period of flower- 
ing occurs after the first, solitary 
flowers, which also produce fruits, 
appearing at the ends of the branchlets 
of recent growth. In these flowers the 
corolla persists, and as the receptacles 
enlarge the petals take on a greenish 
tint. At the beginning of autumn there 
is a third period of flowering, but the 
fruits produced do not ripen. 
1In Bull. de la Station de Recherches Forestiéres pour l’Afrique du Nord, Alger, 1916. 
416 
