46 THE BOOK OF PEARS AND PLUMS 



PEARS IN AN UNHEATED ORCHARD HOUSE 



With skill and care pears may be successfully grown in 

 an unheated orchard house. They may have apples for 

 their companions, but not cherries, peaches, plums or 

 apricots. The most convenient house is a span-roof from 

 20 to 24 feet wide, lo to 12 feet high to the ridge of the 

 roof, and 4^ to 6 feet at the sides. Ventilators should run 

 round the sides 18 inches wide, and hinged at bottom; 

 the top ventilators should be 3 feet wide by 15 inches, 7-J 

 feet apart, on alternate sides of the ridge (Mr T. Somers 

 Rivers, in Royal HorticulturalJournal, vol. xxv., parts i., 

 ii). A good length for this breadth is 50 to 60 feet. A 

 half-inch wire protection over the ventilators and an 

 inner wired door may be as necessary (as a protection 

 against birds), as it is for cherries. There should be 

 a path made hard with clay and gravel through the 

 centre. Some advise a concrete floor ; others prefer 

 to plunge their pots inside as well as out. A lean-to 

 house from 6 to 9 feet wide against a south wall may 

 be of great service. Cordons can be grown on the wall, 

 or planted outside and trained indoors, like vines, near 

 the glass. Trees in pots can also be placed there. 

 With either house, some ground to which the trees 

 in pots can be removed when all danger from frost is 

 over is required. It should be warm and well sheltered. 

 Maiden plants may be put into 8 or lo-inch pots in 

 September, and cut back later on, but time is saved 

 by purchasing older trees of nurserymen; 15 to 

 1 8-inch pots will be needed in a few years. If there 

 is a concrete floor, the pots must be raised on bricks, 

 that surplus water may pass off. If the pots are plunged, 

 care must be taken that the water can run away. In 

 June take them into the open air, plunge them in the 

 ground within three inches of the rim, to keep them 

 warm and moist, and to protect the trees from the wind. 



