PEARS. 29 



our Kieffer, Le Conte, Garber, and some minor varieties which 

 possess Chinese blood in a greater or less degree and which have 

 made pear culture possible in sections of the United States where 

 the European varieties have utterly failed. 



WILD PEARS IX NORTHERN CHINA. 



There are a few species of wild pears (Pyrus) in northern China 

 which are of great importance to the Chinese and may become so to 

 us. The true Chinese pear (Pyrus cliinensis) is found growing spar- 

 ingly in copses in mountain valleys in the Chihli and Shantung 

 provinces. The writer always found these trees as isolated specimens. 

 They are tall trees of open growth and bear small yellow fruit on very 

 long peduncles. The calyx is deciduous. The leaves are few but 

 large, long pointed, and are glossy green above and light green be- 

 neath. The trunks have a light-brown color; the bark comes off in 

 strips and the trunks are fairly smooth. This type of tree has proba- 

 bly given rise to the hard-fleshed, yellow-fruited strain of pears, with 

 deciduous calyxes, which is so commonly cultivated in northern China. 

 This group prefers warm, sheltered nooks, and is not found hi very cold 

 or exposed localities. (S. P. I. No. 17176.) 



There is another type of wild pear quite distinct from that men- 

 tioned above. This variety is found on the plains, at the foot of 

 mountains, and here and there on the lower slopes of mountains 

 and hills. It generally grows in clumps and even in large groves. 

 The trees are densely headed and possess spiny branches. The fruit 

 is small and flat, with a very short peduncle and a persistent calyx. It 

 is greenish yellow in color and astringent and inedible before freezing, 

 but after a heavy frost it becomes soft and yellow and has a slightly 

 sour taste. The trees grow to large dimensions in favorable locali- 

 ties. At Shinglungshan, northeast of Peking, there are specimens 

 that grow from 60 to 80 feet high and have trunks from 2 to 3 feet in 

 diameter. The wood has a fine light-brown color and is utilized in 

 the manufacture of printing blocks and wooden combs. The trunks 

 are of a blackish color and, when old, deeply furrowed. This variety, 

 or perhaps species, grows in the colder parts of northern China, in 

 Manchuria, and eastern Siberia, and improved varieties are being 

 grown as far north as Khabarovsk, where the mercury is frozen nearly 

 every winter. 



This species of pear has given rise, in all probability, to the mellow- 

 fleshed pears of northern China; if not to all of them, certainly to 

 the "Ta suan li," the f 'Mo pan suan li," and the "Guarrli," all three 

 of which resemble very closely the wild type. (S. P. I. Xos. 17177, 

 19604, 20243, 20267, 20336, 20337, 21880,^21918, and 21923.) 



Another type -of pear, called the "Tang li/' grows wild here and 

 there in the Shantung Province. In characteristics it stands midway 



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