Pears are more mysterious than you may think

We have a spot on our front hill where a thorny shrub has been trying to thrive for years, and for years we have battled it, removing it wherever we found it. Yesterday, I found a spot, in a cleft between two boulders lower down on our slope in a wild area, where this thorny shrub has grown unmolested for a few years. But there are pears atop the branches!

What is this craziness? And then I learned that most pears are thorny when young, and the thorns disappear when the tree is mature. Most nursery pear trees are sold when mature, and are thus thornless. Ours must be a chance seedling planted by a bird. We'll harvest after the Fall equinox, then let the pears ripen at room temperature (they don't ripen on the tree), and then when the flesh beside the stem is soft, they're ready to eat, and we'll find out just what kind of pears these are--right now they look like Bosc (brown, rough surface) but on one side a pretty rosy blush is appearing, so who knows?

Sometimes, pears will "escape" into the wild, creating thorny thickets that puncture tractor tires and cause real mayhem with their thorns. But, in thinking about it, it's a great way for the tree to repel predators like deer, and once the tree is tall enough, it doesn't need the thorns anymore as the growing tips are out of the deer's reach. And, I'm here to tell you, these are some pretty nasty thorns!

Moral: When you are trying to kill or demolish something, first be very certain that this is what you want to do!

We are pretty happy that our destructive efforts failed. And, BTW (as this is a wine blog), I made a pear wine once that made several wine lovers think it was a white vinifera wine.

More info is found here.