Pear Production

Pear harvesting and production are in full swing right now. The Bartlett tree in the yard has been dropping nearly a three gallon bucketful each night. My first order of business each day is to pick up the fruit to save them from the dogs, deer or elk. Did I just say dogs? Yes, I did. My canines and coyotes also for that matter love the fruit and will sit under the tree to wait for a pear to drop to them.

The dogs especially enjoy a good pear and prefer those big, unblemished ones to the duds that are scarred, scabby or misshapen. By beating them to the tree in the morning, I pick out the best ones on the ground to put them into the garage and are spread out on a table to ripen. It takes anywhere from one day to nearly a week for the pears to change from hard green nobs to golden sweetness.

From there I have been dehydrating like crazy and canning usually once a week to keep them used up. I will still have to do one more dehydrator load tomorrow but will need to kick up my game and begin making pear bread and pear upside down cake for the freezer and for gifting. The pears will most likely all be off the Bartlett tree by the end of the weekend.