Deciduous, unevenly domed tree 12-15 m tall, with ascending branches and thorny short shoots. Young shoots hairless. Leaves 4-8 cm long (to 10 cm on young shoots), broadly ovate, with a short, tapering tip, hairless, glossy, marginal teeth more or less rounded; autumn colouring orange and scarlet. Leaf stalk variable, 2-8 cm long. Flowers 2-2.5 cm wide, white, slightly unpleasant-smelling, in clusters of about 6-10, on stalks 1.5-3 cm long; Sept-Oct. Stamens 15-25, anthers purplish, styles 2(3). Fruit spherical to oval,1-1.5 cm wide, brown with pale spots and thin stalk, chambers 2-3; generally prolific; ripening about March.
Suitable for drier, warm areas. Sometimes used as a stock for budding of ornamental cultivars as well as for the edible pears because it is tolerant of heavy, wet soils: 'D6' is the stock produced at Gosford Research Station, NSW.
C and SE China.
Leaf teeth rounded; calyx shed from fruit; stamens 15-25; fruit cf. P. ussuriensis.
ACT: Hughes (Kitchener St). SA: Glen Osmond (Claremont Ave, outside Waite Institute); Millswood (Argyle St); Pasadena (Centennial Park Cemetery).
Source: (2002). Rosaceae. In: . Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 3. Flowering plants. Dicotyledons. Part 2. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.
A fast growing selection with a well-rounded crown, abundant flowers, tough wavy leaves, no thorny shoots, fruits that persist on the tree, and attractive autumn foliage in a suitable climate, it is also resistant to fire blight and other diseases. Self-sterile, producing fruits only when cross-pollinated. Selected at the us Plant Introduction Station in Glenn Dale, Maryland, from seed collected in 1918 from the mountains of Yichang, China. Released in America in 1960, where it soon became popular as an ornamental street tree. Possibly confused with 'Redspire' in the Australian trade.
Pyrus calleryana 'Chanticleer'
Columnar habit and yellowish red attractive autumn colour. Int. E. Scanlon, usa.
Int. in 1975 by Princeton Nsy of New Jersey as a 'Bradford' seedling that has an earlier dormant period and larger but fewer flowers. Very susceptible to Fireblight. An American plant patent 3815.