92 THE PEARS OF NEW YORK 



best in rather heavy loams, clays, and even in silts. Many varieties show 

 preferences for the several types of loam and clay, and the commercial 

 grower must see to it that the varieties he plants are suited in their particu- 

 lar soil preference. Hybrids between the common pear and the oriental 

 pear — the Kieffer and its kin — grow well in much lighter soils than 

 pure-bred sorts of the common pear, and, as a rule, find sands and gravels 

 more to their liking than clays and heavy loams. Pears will stand rather 

 more water in the soil than any other of their orchard associates, but a 

 soil water-soaked for any great length of time in the growing season is a 

 poor medium in which to grow pears. If, therefore, a soil is not sufficiently 

 dry naturally it must be tile-drained. 



Pear soils must be fertile. All varieties of this fruit refuse to produce 

 good crops in soils lacking an abundance of the several chemical elements 

 of plant nutrition. Even the light soils on which Kieffer, Garber, and 

 Le Conte seem to do best must be well stored with plant-food. This means 

 that good pear land is costly. Soils that grow good pears usually grow 

 good farm crops. Pears planted in a poor soil do not live but linger. Who 

 has not seen short -wooded, rough, malformed, dwarfed, starved trees which 

 have come to their wretched condition because planted on land not fertile 

 enough for this fruit? The land-skinner who grows grass in his orchard 

 usually comes to grief quickly. Pears start best in a virgin soil from which 

 the forest has not been long removed; on the other hand, they are often 

 hard to start on senile soils even though they have been heavily fertilized. 

 Plenty of humus seems to stimulate pears. There is a prejudice against 

 soils too rich, some holding that on overly rich land the growth is soft and 

 sappy and therefore a good medium for the multiplication of the blight 

 bacteria. This is mostly prejudice, but certain it is that culture and 

 fertility should not be so managed that the growth continues late, and the 

 trees go into the winter soft and tender to cold. 



Soils seem to have a profound influence on the flavor and texture of 

 pears. In uncongenial soils the fruits are often so sour or astringent, dry 

 or gritty, that the product is poor in quality; whereas the pears of the same 

 variety in a soil to which it is suited are choicely good. A few varieties, 

 as Bartlett, Clapp Favorite, and Seckel, grow well and produce fine fruit 

 in a great diversity of soils, but most sorts do so much better in one 

 soil than in another that it becomes a matter of prime importance in 

 pear-growing to discover the particular adaptations of the varieties to be 

 planted. To discover an ideal soil for a variety is about the highest 

 desideratum in pear-growing. 



