There is no commercial growing of dwarf pears in this State, except some trees owned by the A. Block Company, Santa Clara.  The late Mr. Block had an old orchard of dwarf trees, planted perhaps forty or fifty years ago, which he converted into an approach to a standard orchard by removing alternate rows, and the trees being otherwise treated like standards have been satisfactorily producing pears for many years.  How far these trees are still on the dwarf roots and how far they have supplied themselves with roots from the variety growth above, we do not know.  There is no disposition whatever to plant dwarf trees in this State except among a few amateurs who are making home fruit gardens.  In view of the successful growth of standard trees in this State, there seem to be no adequate reasons for recourse to dwarf trees.

Yield in Drying Pears.

What is the loss of weight in drying Bartlett pears?

They run from 7 to 8 lbs. of fresh pears to 1 lb. hard dried.  There is quite wide variation according to condition of the fruit.  Probably about 7 1/2 to 1 would be as near a realizable ratio as you could get by arbitrary estimate.

Pear Problems.

Kindly let me know the advisability of grafting Bartlett pears onto apple trees.  In replanting pears in young orchard, how would it do to take rooted pear suckers, graft the Bartlett on them, and save the cost of nursery stock?  Last year my five-year-old Bartlett orchard was full of blossoms, but, though many pears became as large as white beans, the majority of them dropped.

The pear and apple do not make a good union.  The grafts may grow for a while, but finally fail.  Do not use suckers as stocks.  You can dig up some year roots and use them as starters by making root-grafts with Bartlett scions and do better than with suckers, but a good pear seedling is the proper thing either for budding or root grafting.  Unless you have some experience in such work, it will be cheaper in the end to buy good nursery trees.  The nonbearing of your young trees is probably due to their youth and vigor.

Bees and Pear Blight.

A few years ago, I planted alfalfa between my pear trees and the trees bore a very heavy crop that year.  Then blight made its appearance, and it was claimed that the bees carried the blight.  I therefore plowed under the alfalfa and destroyed what few beehives I had.  If the theory that the bees carry the blight from tree to tree is not correct, I will experiment with alfalfa again this year.

It is true that bees carry pear blight.  It is also true that you are not likely to get many pears without bees to pollinate the blossoms.  You cannot escape the carriage of the pear blight by removing tame bees, because wild bees are abundant in all parts of the State.  The way to overcome the blight is to pursue it by amputation of diseased branches continually, so that there may be no contamination for the bees to carry.  You are certainly warranted in continuing your alfalfa growing without regard to this question, using water enough to keep the alfalfa growing well without saturating the soil to the injury of the trees or inducing too much summer growth on them.