Grafting onto the cursed Callery Pears – the Problem is the Solution

Big win for 2025:

I bark grafted and cleft grafted Asian pears and European pears onto the cursed Callery pears, the spiny rootstock of Bradford pears taking over my pasture.

Callery pears bark graft — Bark graft – Asian and European pears onto Callery pear

Callery pears cleft graft — Cleft graft – Turnbull onto Callery pear

10 months later, the Turnbull has 10 feet (!) of growth on it and is wider than 2X my thumb.

Turnbull pear cleft graft on Callery pear — Turnbull pear cleft grafted on Callery pear

Turnbull pear cleft grafted on Callery pear

The Asian pears are also 5-6 feet of growth.

Chojuro and European pears bark grafted onto Callery pear

Callery pears are nearly impossible to get rid of. Then late Winter last year, my apple guy said, “You could graft onto those and you will have fruit and a full orchard in 2 years.”

These will fruit in 1 more year (as opposed to 4-5 years if I grafted it onto new rootstock).

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