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Invasive Bradford (Callery) pear tree is banned in Pennsylvania
- fullstop 5y agoHa. My parents had a Bradford Pear which split in half due to an ice storm, and was replaced with a Cleveland Pear.
- nneonneo 5y ago> It took a while to realize that different sterile cultivars within the reach of the same pollinating insect could cross pollinate and produce fertile fruit. “Life, uh, finds a way.”
- delabay 5y agoI grew up in midwestern suburbs where Bradfords were planted with great enthusiasm. I can see the appeal, they have neat symmetry, create no mess besides the leaves and don't get too big. Their semen-like flower scent filled the air in the spring, and they were drawn and quartered during the summer storms or winter ice. I have fond memories of watching a massive summer storm from a friends bedroom and witnessing the moment his front yard Bradford split in half. The same tree would later split in half again during the winter. Invasive or not, Bradfords will always hold a special place in my heart.
- MengerSponge 5y agoTo say Bradfords "create no mess" is about as true as "clean coal"! They create an enormous mess when they inevitably grow big and brittle and start dropping half of the tree on your lawn/house.
- delabay 5y agoThis does not factor into the decision making process of a property developer in the 90-00's. i stand by my original phrasing.
- dlbucci 5y agoI had no idea that these were the plant responsible for so-called "Jizz Blossoms". There was always one week in the Fall where you'd smell 'em walking to class...
- rayiner 5y ago> Their semen-like flower scent filled the air in the spring, They're all over GA Tech campus. We always compared the smell to cement though. :D
- xref 5y agolol “semen-like” scent is right, we called them boiled-mushroom trees
- nate_meurer 5y agoTHey taste better than they smell.
- EdwardDiego 5y ago> Their semen-like flower scent Well, not sure if that's better or worse than the scent of a hawthorn, that at best, can be described as "animalistic", but has always smelled to me like a decomposing possum, or dog poo. https://www.irishtimes.com/news/sexy-smell-of-hawthorn-1.160794 https://www.irishtimes.com/news/sexy-smell-of-hawthorn-1.160...
- SECProto 5y agoCan we change "Pa" in the title to "Pennsylvania"? As a non-american, it was difficult to confirm this (article only used the abbreviation, so I had to open a source about 3/4 of the way down and read that page's header image to confirm)
- dls2016 5y agoI have one in my yard from previous owners, maybe this is the kick I need to cut it down. Maybe replace it with a native mulberry or pawpaw. Still have a few Trees of Heaven that were covered in spotted lantern flies the last two summers (2021 moreso). Those jerks destroyed my first grape harvest.
- jefflombardjr 5y agoThe bugs are not at fault here. The people who created the environment for them to thrive are. Edit After Downvote: I get it - They were a major nuisance to you. Lanternflys weren't a one time thing. This has happened before - remember stink bugs? This has happened many times and it is going to get worse. Please don't shoot the messenger.
- dls2016 5y agoStink bugs, gypsy moths, Japanese beetles... I get it. The wave of SLF hit Central PA right as my first grape vines were maturing. But Tree of Heaven is also an invasive species, native to China like the SLF; it's their favorite host plant. The SLF invasion can be very "spotty". If I eliminate the stand of Tree of Heaven from my yard, the SLF will probably go elsewhere. I don't use pesticides or herbicides of any sort... just some copper fungicide for my fruit trees.
- Dylan16807 5y ago> The bugs are not at fault here. The people who created the environment for them to thrive are. And when species like this thrive in the native environment?
- nsp 5y agoBe careful with mulberries, I had one in my last place (not sure if it was native), and it dropped 10lbs+ of incredibly soft berries, so effectively black dye into my back yard daily for several months a year
- dls2016 5y ago
- exposingtruth 5y ago
- kube-system 5y agoI think you misunderstand the regulation. The law doesn't apply to the plant itself. It prohibits people from from artificially propagating it further. > Might as well try to ban kudzu while you're at it, lol. It is already on the list. https://www.agriculture.pa.gov/Plants_Land_Water/PlantIndustry/NIPPP/Pages/Controlled-Plant-Noxious-Weed.aspx https://www.agriculture.pa.gov/Plants_Land_Water/PlantIndust...
- exposingtruth 5y ago
- exposingtruth 5y ago
- jefflombardjr 5y agoWhen I see this article and the state announcement, I think of the Robert Pirsig Quote: "If a revolution destroys a systematic government, but the systematic patterns of thought that produced that government are left intact, then those patterns will repeat themselves in the succeeding government. There’s so much talk about the system. And so little understanding." As someone originally from Pennsylvania - PA seems especially excited about invasive species. The spotted lantern fly was a big nuisance. Everyone talked about it. The spotted lantern fly and even this pear tree are not the enemy. Invasive species thrive in ecosystems that we create. You don't want spotted lantern flys? You don't want thorny pear trees? Maybe ask who is defining the term "invasive species" and why they are defining them as such? Anyone thinking about cutting down your pear tree. Read "Beyond the War on Invasive Species: A Permaculture Approach to Ecosystem Restoration" [0] 0: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/25782048-beyond-the-war-on-invasive-species https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/25782048-beyond-the-w...
- ch4s3 5y agoNot a glowing endorsement by someone in the field https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2330107179?book_show_action=true&from_review_page=1 https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2330107179?book_show_a...
- jefflombardjr 5y ago"Someone in the field"? I'm sorry but an anonymous comment on good reads, should not hold the same weight as a book that references academic papers. In any case it isn't as black and white as "Invasive = Bad" one doesn't need to look far for that evidence. https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-potential-conservation-value-of-non-native-Schlaepfer-Sax/cc23d465380f3cc90b82493328f7c69697ee439c https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-potential-conserva... https://spartina.org/project_documents/revegetation_program/CLRA%20Report%202012.pdf https://spartina.org/project_documents/revegetation_program/...
- ch4s3 5y agoI'm not really commenting on the thesis of the book, but pointing out what seemed like a valid criticism of the book overall. After skimming a few articles on the subject [1] it seem like the reviewer is not out of line with scientific consensus on the example he points out. [1] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&as_ylo=2010&q=zebra+mussels+great+lakes+impact&btnG= https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&as_yl...
- dang 5y agoRelated from yersterday: In Defense of Bradford Pear (2021) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29863917 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29863917 - Jan 2022 (12 comments)
- atourgates 5y agoAnother interesting Callery Pear fact (and basically the only one I know), is that the "Survivor Tree" at the 9/11 memorial in NYC is a Callery Pear: https://www.911memorial.org/visit/memorial/survivor-tree https://www.911memorial.org/visit/memorial/survivor-tree I can't explain why, but it was the most moving part of our time there when we finally visited last year. And, the reason I haven't been able to bring myself to cut down the Callery that's growing on our property, despite my otherwise wholesale dedication to removing invasives.
- tomohawk 5y agoFirst thing we did when we bought our place was to start cutting them down. There were 5 of them, and they were at the point where limbs would start breaking off of them for no reason. We were doing 1 a week, but that wasn't fast enough. One of them dropped a really large, live limb on a sunny, windless day. Easily could have killed someone. It took another 5 years of aggressive use of roundup to kill the suckers that sprung from their roots all over the place.