Pyrus pyrifolia
Nashi pear
Common names: Asian pear, Apple pear
At a glance
- Light
- Full sun
- Hardiness
- Hardy down to −20 °C
- Pruning
- Feb–Mar
- Harvest
- Aug–Sep
- Spacing
- 350 cm, rows 400 cm
- Water need
- Medium
This description was machine-translated.
Description
The Nashi pear resembles a round apple in appearance but tastes crisp and juicy like a particularly refreshing pear. It blooms early and profusely, making it a welcome forage for bees. For a good harvest, plant a pear or a second Nashi variety as a pollinator nearby.
Care instructions
Plant the tree in a sunny spot with nutrient-rich, well-draining soil, preferably in autumn (October, week 43). Because of its early flowering, choose a location protected from late frosts. Prune in winter (February, week 8) to remove excess growth, and harvest the fruit from August once it begins to loosen slightly from the branch.
The care notes were machine-translated from German.
Garden year
HarvestAug–Sep
Soil & site
Soil pH
Soil type
loamy, humus-rich, well-drained
Give the nashi pear a deep, humus-rich and well-drained soil without waterlogging. Unlike the European cultivated pear, it does not like strongly calcareous soil. In the neutral to lime-rich range, chlorosis from iron and magnesium deficiency threatens; a slightly acidic soil is ideal.
Feeding
Medium feeder
Months
Mar–Apr
In early spring before it shoots, apply mature compost to the tree's root zone and work it in shallowly; horn shavings as a slow-acting nitrogen source complement this well. Do not feed from high summer, so the shoots ripen in time. Well-rooted trees often manage entirely without extra feeding if you mulch the root zone regularly.
Pruning
Prune your nashi in late winter (February to March, weeks 6 to 13) while dormant, before bud break, as an annual thinning cut with some rejuvenation, because nashi age faster than European pears. Shoots affected by fire blight you cut back separately in summer, well into healthy wood; that is not part of the regular pruning.
Overwintering
Mature nashi pears are hardy in the lowlands of Germany, Austria and Switzerland and need no protection outdoors; for young plants in the first years, cover the root zone around the trunk with leaves or brushwood, and stand containers sheltered from the wind against a house wall on an insulating base. The real danger is not winter cold, but late frost on the early April blossom. So choose a wind-sheltered site without a frost pocket from the start.
Propagation
Methods
- Grafting
- Layering
You propagate nashi pears true to the cultivar exclusively by grafting. Sowing yields genetically deviating seedlings that bear fruit only after many years and often with atypical fruit. Suitable rootstocks are seedlings of the European cultivated pear (Pyrus communis) as well as the clonal rootstock ‘Pyrodwarf’, which as a Pyrus rootstock unites without problems with all common nashi varieties. Quince (Cydonia oblonga) is incompatible with many pear varieties and then needs an interstock graft; for nashi in the home garden you are better off avoiding it. For winter scion grafting, in February cut scions from dormant wood, keep them cool and moist until grafting and join them in March to the still dormant rootstock. Common cuts are whip-and-tongue grafting (with rootstock and scion of equal thickness), cleft grafting or wedge grafting. Budding (chip budding or T-budding), on the other hand, is done in July to August, when the bark of the rootstock lifts well: you take a single bud of the desired variety and slide it under the cut bark. Keep the graft union bound tightly with grafting tape. Alternatively, air layering is possible and with pears actually works more reliably than cuttings: in early summer, ring-score a one- to two-year-old shoot, wrap the wound with moist sphagnum moss and seal it airtight in plastic film. After a few weeks roots form; then you separate the rooted layer and pot it up. This gives trees true to the cultivar, but on their own roots. Lacking a dwarfing rootstock, they grow more vigorously and are more laborious for the hobby gardener.
Companion planting
Companion planting is partly traditional gardening lore. Where the reason is known, it is given.
Some of these explanations were machine-translated.
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From the magazine
Growing nashi: the crisp, juicy Asian pear for the home garden
The nashi looks like an apple, tastes like a pear and stays crisp instead of going soft. Here is how to plant the Asian pear, why you need two varieties and when the best harvest day arrives.
Training an espalier: apple and pear flat on the wall
On an espalier apple and pear bear in the smallest space. How to get the spot, the wire frame and the summer pruning right so a narrow wall becomes a fruit surface.
Renovating an Old Fruit Tree: The Three-Winter Renovation Pruning Plan
An overgrown fruit tree can be saved, but not in a single day. The three-winter plan for old apple, pear, and cherry trees.
Quince in the home garden: varieties, harvest and use
The quince is robust, self-fertile and bears alone. Apple versus pear quince, the late harvest point and what becomes of the hard fruit, from jelly to liqueur.
Recognising fruit tree diseases: scab, fire blight, brown rot and more
An identification helper for the five commonest fruit tree diseases: apple scab, fire blight, brown rot, pear rust and peach leaf curl. How to recognise each by its damage, why fire blight is notifiable, and how an airy crown and tree hygiene prevent most problems.