Supercolumn apple replacement

pierre_de_gaye

Finally gave up on our 'Saturn' cultivar - grown as a supercolumn against a wall - due to a constant never-ending battle with the awful woolly aphid.  

Tree came out relatively easily - was perhaps 3/4 years old or so.

I wanted to replace it with a 'moonshine' pear supercolumn but wanted to be absolutely sure that woolly aphids will not plague a pear tree.    We have a conference pear and apart from nasty black spots on the leaves every year, the tree is healthy and fruit unaffected.

I would also entertain alternatives - we have enough plums (3 varieties) in the garden so was thinking a pear.   No more apples - we have a few free-standing trees that are thankfully not affected by the woolly aphid strangely, yet the one by the wall was literally dripping with them these past few seasons and enough is enough, it has to go.

Apricots I gather do not do well as supercolumns - it does need to be this form as space is limited (fan not possible).

Thanks all.

AnniD

Bumping up for any fruit experts (not me, sadly) 

fidgetbones

The only pear I would grow on its own is Conference. All the others need at least one pollinator.

Dovefromabove

We grow the pear Concorde without a pollinator and get good crops. It’s a cross between Conference and Doyenne du Comice. 

  

We grow it as an espalier but it’s available as a Supercolumn type

https://www.chrisbowers.co.uk/product/pear-concorde/

pierre_de_gaye

Yes I've already got a conference as well as a concorde , both free standing bush forms.

The conference is now fruiting well but the concorde has never done so, not sure what's going on. It's only a year younger than the conference - I gather they can be slower coming into bearing?   I've tried summer pruning it last year and this year so hoping sooner or later it will fruit?  It has had very small amounts of blossom only.   One fruit grew a bit this year but then dropped off accidentally when I knocked the tree moving past it.

So pollination won't be an issue with the two I mentioned in the original post I don't think what with the conference being available for that purpose.

I just want to make sure that the woolly aphid will not affect a supercolumn pear.

pierre_de_gaye

Your pear looks like it's fruiting well if that photo is anything to go by.  Hopefully ours might start doing so sooner or later seeing as it's more than 6 years old now.

I've ordered from Chris Bowers before but refuse to do so in future after they sent what turned out to be the wrong cherry tree (too late to remove) and also a wrong plum tree - a now established supercolumn that again isn't possible to remove.   They have poor reviews online and it's not easy to see why.