How to Know when Pears are Ready to Pick

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Harvesting pears is easy!

It's pear season! Know when European pears are ready to pick and how to tell when they are ripe. Don't harvest them too late! Learn how to pick and store your pears so they will be perfect for cooking and fresh eating.

If you’re waiting for your traditional European pears to “feel” ripe on the tree, you’re waiting too long and your pears will be overripe when you harvest them.

When left on the tree, pears ripen from the inside out and, by the time they seem to be at the ripe stage, they are beyond it and you usually get a mushy/mealy texture. So you want to harvest them before they are ripe on the tree. 

When they are ready to pick, it will be dependent upon the variety, location, and weather, but start checking trees in August.

The best way to tell if a pear is ready to harvest is by taking the fruit in your hand and tilting it horizontally. The mature fruit will quickly come away from the branch at this angle. It will hold on to the branch if it is not yet ready for picking.

Once harvested, most pears will require about a week to ripen at room temperature or, speed up the process by putting them in a brown paper bag.

Stark Brothers offers a wide range of pear trees:

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