THE BEST PEAR FOR EXPORT.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VIII, Issue 627, 13 December 1913, Page 6

THE BEST PEAR FOR EXPORT.

In the course of a paper read before the Hawke's Bay Fruitgrower's Association, Mr Allan White, referring to pears for export, said that there were few pears grown in the district that were worth a moment' 3 thought for the export trade, and to his mind the number was narrowed down to one, P. Barry. This pear would keep quite a long time under good conditions without cold storage, and if picked at the proper time, would, he believed, carry round the world without any appreciable deterioration. Contrary to many growers' opinions, this vari Q ty if not picked too soon, and if ripened in the proper manner after being taken out of cool store, was a most delicious fruit, almost equal to any other late pear. Too much could not be said in praise of this pear; and it should be grown much more extensively in the Hawke's Bay district which suited it? strong and rapid growth. Other varieties very suitable for cool storage were Beurre Clairgeau, Winter Nelis, Winter Cole and Josephine de Malines, but these, under the present conditions of storage on board ship he did not think would carry to North America nor European markets, althougfaany of the four varieties should arrive safely at South American ports, ii a market could be found for them there. At present they might safely say that it did not pay to cool-store the earlier varieties of pears such as William Bon Chretien and Louis de Jersey. Several growers attemptsd to store these two varieties this season, and although varying results were obtained one and all met with rather heavy loss. It was quite evident that with our present insufficient knowledge of the exact temperatures required and proper condition of fruit at time of picking for cool storage, we should not attempt to store many of these two thin skinned varieties yet a while. Notwithstanding this, experiments with William Bon Chretien in America had proved that this near could be successfully cool-stored there, but it required great care both in picking at the correct time and observation during the period of storage, as change of temperature even the slightest was most harmful. As for Luuiee Bonne da Jersey be could gather very little information about it-3 keeping qualities in America, but their local experiments had proved that it kept a little better than the Williams Bon Chretien in the Hawke's Bay district.