Päärynä Pyrus communis "Vidzeme"

• Type: fruit tree, summer pear
• Botanical name: Pyrus communis 'Vidzeme'
• Height and spread: medium-sized tree, about 4 m
• Fruit: large, round, yellow-green with a red blush, sweet; ripen in August, short storage
• Light: full sun
• Soil: fertile, well-drained
• Hardiness: good, suits the Estonian climate (zone 5)
• Use: fresh eating, juice, jam
• Size: potted plant (grafted tree)

Planting. Plant in a sunny spot sheltered from wind, where the water table is deep. Dig a hole about 60×60 cm, fill it with compost and garden soil and keep the graft union 5–10 cm above the soil. Stake the young tree.

Watering and feeding. In the first summer water deeply once a week in dry spells. In spring give a fruit-tree fertiliser with nitrogen; in the second half of summer use a potassium- and phosphorus-rich feed so the wood ripens before winter.

Care. Shape the crown in the first years in early spring before bud break: keep 3–5 strong scaffold branches and remove competing and inward-growing shoots. Later, thinning and sanitary pruning are enough.

Gardener's tip. Pears need a pollinator: plant another pear variety that flowers at the same time nearby. Protect the trunk of a young tree with mesh against voles and hares in winter and whitewash it in autumn.