Kitchen Garden Forum

It was, until a couple of days ago, a very healthy looking tree.
There had been lots of blossom on it, we had covered it in fleece during frost periods, and pears had started to form

Then we noticed it .................................... it did not look at all good.

We read up on it and concluded that it was a fungal infection. All that we read gave the same message,
that there was no commercial cure available for the 'home grower'.

Even if we had managed to get hold of a professional commercial preparation any fruit produced this year could not be eaten.
We were also concerned about spray drift as apple trees, strawberries and rhubarb are in adjacent beds. These would also be rendered inedible for this year if spray drifted.

Hardly a leaf was clear, a decision had to be made and fast. Our interpretation of the written advice says get rid of it



Decision made
I have taken tree loppers to it !!!!



I seriously doubt it will send out new shoots, even if it does there is the question of whether the trunk is infected and will the disease just come back.

Today I am going to give it, and the ground around it, a wash with Jeyes fluid. Nothing ventured, nothing gained and certainly nothing to lose.

Having then carried out the above I may yet, subject to any further advice received, just dig the whole thing up and remove it from the site.

Hi Pa Snip,
I sadly have to agree with your conclusion. I suspct that you treatment was for too harsh.
I think that for starters you should have removed all affected leaves and spurs and waited to see what affect that had.
Had you left some leaves itwould have at least kept the tree alive. It will be a miracle if your tree survives.
JB.

Couldn't agree more Johnboy, I would love to have left some leaves on there but in all seriousness there were none that were not infected.
To clear the infected leaves I had to take it back that far.

The intention at that point was to remove it, but then I thought I might just give it a chance.
My head says I am wasting my time, just dig it up and get rid.

Sadly there is still a likelihood even those remnants are holding fungal spores and it has to go.

Yesterday whilst I was carrying out this operation on the tree it was a case of 'me beating the challenge of nature'
Today I'm now thinking that if no one in the RHS and other professional organisations has come up with a cure, who the hell am I to kid myself that I can beat nature.

But then I think about my own alien within and the fact 'experts' aren't always right, someone has to find a cure sometime (I hope)

My Williams pear tree gets this most years, sometimes not badly and sometimes awful. It still fruits ok it just doesn't look very nice.

It is going on for 30 feet high so I couldn't spray it anyway.

The quince in a different part of the garden suffers from the same problem.

Your remedy seems a bit drastic Pasnip.

Thanks PP

Have you ever seen oil paintings of surgeons on board ship with their bloody saw in hand, that's me in this instance.
Poor bugger only had a blister on his heal, now he has a limp

I admit I might, just might mind, have gone slightly over the top

Pa Snip wrote:Poor bugger only had a blister on his heal, now he has a limp

Limp? Looks like he left without the entire leg, and 3 toes on the other foot

It will most likely try to send a lot of water shoots out at or near the cut ends.

PP

I think you might well be right, I had thought about watershoots taking advantage from below the graft but your comment has made me wonder about the main trunk itself..

Methinks that if I see a suitable possible replacement whilst out and about in the near future I may well be tempted.

Not counting chickens (Or pears), but there may be hope

14 days since that last picture of one lonesome shoot growth was noticed.

That one shoot has leaf growth of a pear so not reckoning on it being watershoot.

And what has happened in the last two weeks ??

Well there has been some more growth .............................




All may not be lost after all, fingers crossed.

I thought it would do this but, i have never had one shoot yellow circles out before...

Its the practice session for the annual pear lassoing event

Well having gone this far with it, it seems only fair to give it another chance and be prepared to see what happens.
I think these infections and attacks can sometimes be lived with.
Every year now I get insect attacks on my redcurrant bush leaves and grape vine leaves which leave ugly blisters on many of the leaves yet the fruit is unimpaired.
Possibly the fact that you have given it the Chelsea Chop early enough in the growing season has ensured the tree has enough inner strength to continue the fight. If you'd done it at the end of the season you may have killed it off permanently.

I don't know whether insects have a sense of smell but if they do, they probably won't like Jeyes Fluid any more than humans do !

Primrose wrote:Well having gone this far with it, it seems only fair to give it another chance and be prepared to see what happens.

Possibly the fact that you have given it the Chelsea Chop early enough in the growing season has ensured the tree has enough inner strength to continue the fight. If you'd done it at the end of the season you may have killed it off permanently.

I don't know whether insects have a sense of smell but if they do, they probably won't like Jeyes Fluid any more than humans do !

Exactly my thinking as well on all three counts