Kal: Something is wrong if your 20th Century (Nijiseiki) pears are reaching only golfball size. Asian pears need to be thinned heavily, sometimes over and over again, to allow the remaining fruit to achieve the size it should. I thin mine about 4 times, and the remaining pears reach over 3/4 pounds each. I am assuming here that you would prefer to have fewer large fruits than a whole basketfull of golfballs. Yellow skin generally means ripe, or nearly ripe, but try Danny Boquet's trick of shining a light through them at night to see if they are translucent. I have been doing this for years, and it is quite interesting. When the fruit is full of sugars, the light passes right through. Also specify your location next time you post. You may not be in the ideal climate to grow Asian pears, although they are widely adaptable. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

FN is correct and if you are getting the rain I'm getting it's been a lot, although I've not seen any cracking on the varieties of A. pears I'm managing. I suspect the smooth and thin skinned 20th century would be susceptible, but you may also be getting longer wet periods than we are. Or your tree might not be in full sun, which makes cracking worse. Graft a couple other varieties on the tree and enjoy a wider span of harvest, more variety and maybe less susceptibility to cracking. I suggest Korean Giant for your area.

Houston, we have a problem. (sorry, couldn't resist that line..) It looks like your tree had some physical damage there many years ago and it is rotting now. This is a standard tree problem, usually on bigger trees; I don't know the solution however. Many old trees are rotted like that for hundreds of years and it may be best just to leave it. Scott

Korean Giant aka Olympic aka Dan Bae is the best of any I've tried to date. Most reliable in fruiting, best fruit quality, the fruit can keep up to a year in cold storage. The fruit quality is the same whether thinned or not, and actually because the fruit is naturally so big, I think its better not to thin them. Other varieties I've tried MUST be thinned, or the pears are very small, flavorless, and not sweet.