by Venkappa Gani
Gardening in Central Texas has become popular as people move to Texas from other states for job opportunities and a warmer climate. Austin and its surrounding areas have especially shown significant growth. And as the city expands, more people are moving to the suburbs.
Suburban areas have had to build new developments with smaller houses crammed together without much space. As a result, many suburban homes do not have enough space for home gardening. It is a common practice for these homes to be built with two shade trees in the front, but not enough space between or behind the houses for more.
When we moved to Austin and settled into a typical development, we had gardening in mind. We decided to have a vegetable garden with fruit trees in place of shade trees on all sides of the house, as well as the front. Now it has become like a food forest with olives, jujubes, peaches, pears, apples, figs, pomegranates, persimmons and several citrus trees, with space in the center for our vegetable garden.
Growing Pears:
Fruit trees require a certain number of chill hours to produce adequate fruit, and the Central Texas region falls in the low-medium range for chill hours. This affects the number of varieties that can be grown here. Orient pears require 400 chill hours. This tree can be grown in well-drained soil with a pH of 6-7, as long as it has adequate rainfall, full sun and good air circulation. This one is easy to grow compared to apple or peach. It requires less care and less water. The Orient pear has medium-to-large fruit and has a coarse texture.
I planted an Orient pear tree in the space between us and our next door neighbour about 15 years ago, and it produces plenty of fruit every year. This tree is now more than 30 feet tall and 20 feet wide, spreading over my single story roof, and touching the walls on both sides as shown in the photos. Because the Orient pear grows vertically, one has to train the branches to spread horizontally by using weights. It is a prolific producer with minimum care. Each branch has clusters of of 6-7 fruit, 2-3 ft apart, and the branches become so heavy that they touch the ground. I have to lift some of the branches with wooden poles to support the weight. I have even lost a branch that grew so heavy that it broke. I had to cut this branch back to the main trunk. The fruit weighs well over one pound each.
I started picking fruit the last week in June – the green fruit is crunchy and tastes good, eventually ripening to a pinkish/yellow color with sweet juice.
Every week I picked these fruit until I had picked a total weighing 20-40 lbs …and I still left enough for critters to have a feast.
I definitely recommend home gardeners to include this one.
For more information, go to https://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/extension/homefruit/pear/pear.html
Happy fruit gardening!
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