Pyrus × Cydonia hybrid ('Veitchii')

Survives zone 5 through 8

Harvest calendar

Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.

Quince-pear; aromatic, usually cooked.

Hardiness

Zone 5–8

Habit

Tree

Edible part

Fruit

Ripens

Oct

Mature size

Small tree 3–5 m

Light

Full sun

Soil pH

6.0–7.0

Environment

Temperate

Native range

No wild range — a genuine bigeneric hybrid raised by John Seden for Messrs Veitch in 1895, from the pear 'Bergamotte Esperen' pollinated by Portugal quince. Two plants resulted, and everything in cultivation descends from them.

Status

Cultivated

Years to fruit

3–5 yrs

Growth speed

Slow to moderate

Spacing

400 cm (157 in) apart — about 16 m² (172 sq ft) per plant

Leaf shape

Intermediate between its parents: ovate to oblong 5–9 cm, thinly grey-downy beneath as a quince is, but more pointed and more finely toothed, as a pear is.

Root system

The rootstock's — always grafted, on pear seedling for a full-sized tree or quince for a small shallow-rooted one.

Fruit description

A rounded pome to about 8 cm, yellow and quince-scented, the flesh soft and sweet with a decent flavour, and usually seedless. Good fresh in a warm year, more reliable cooked.

Propagation

Budding or grafting. As a bigeneric hybrid it is largely sterile and its fruit usually seedless, and even where seed does form it will not come true. It also earns its keep as a pear interstock and as a virus indicator plant.

Pollination

Largely sterile, as bigeneric hybrids tend to be: the fruit sets without a partner and is usually seedless. Pollination is not the limiting factor, but nor will it ever raise you a seedling.

The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.