Rhubarb, berries, pear tree, broad bean landrace and comfrey

I've made another video taking note of things that I've not recorded, or have visibly changed. This will be quite helpful in keeping track of things like having a visual record of which pear is which on the double-grafted one.  You can't trust the nurseries and orchards and should check these things yourself, I've had several instances where they've botched things.  And also noting the traits of individual varieties of broad bean in the landrace as they cross-pollinate from year to year.

It's another foggy Spring morning. The fog actually lifted earlier, and the sun was so low I almost had to close the blinds so I could work. The grass and dock have taken off in the past two weeks, as has the rhubarb.  I'm going to have to clear the grass before making movies, or taking photos, as it is quite hard to see some things that are growing amongst grass.

I increased the quality the phone camera was recording, and used a weight to try and stablise the camera from shaking.  In this case I basically sat the phone sideways on the rock and held it there, carrying it around.  It seemed to make a difference, but wasn't perfect.

Winter pear

In late Autumn, the Packham's Triumph pear tree flowered in one location and one of these flowers has since pollinated against.. well, I have no idea.  Since then, at the start of Winter, it has gotten down to almost 0°C at least once and there have been white frostings on the ground, but the lone pear keeps growing.

Processing roadside pears

While there's at least twenty roadside apple trees around here, there's only one roadside pear.  The fruit on this goes grainy pretty quick, and is on the smaller side.  However, this year I managed to catch it in the right week and picked enough to dehydrate a few trays.

Looking at the dehydrator, it must have been around three or four trays.

These just filled up a large hinged jar.  Though, dehydrated pear tastes a bit.. perfumy for my liking.  I'm going to try and rehydrate them and see if I can use them that way.

Growing Pears From Seed

Some time earlier in the year, I was saved six seeds from an Angelys Pear I was given. I was told it was a tasty new variety, but honestly, if I recall correctly it was at best mealy and mediocre. In any case, I had it and was interested in trying to save the seeds. I'd earlier tried to save some apple seeds, with little success. So had done some research, and one of the conclusions in a paper I found was that seeds should not be allowed to dry out. So I took the seeds straight from the pear core, and put them in a bag in the fridge where I had some persimmon seeds.

A few months later, I noticed that all six of the pear seeds had sprouted in the bag in the fridge. The following photo has shown them planted out. For anyone trying the same thing, use a decent sized planter bag instead. It only took a week and the taproot had gone through the bottom of the cardboard cup and started heading sideways with the plastic underneath. Now they're outside in planter bags growing vigourously and looking healthy.

A very successful experiment. Will the pears that eventuate taste okay? No idea. That's another experiment.