If you are going to get the Shinko, a good pollinator is Shinseiki. They bloom at the same time in my yard and my son-in-law's yard (both Houston). The shinko is good as long as you don't get too much rain near ripening. They will be bland with the rain.....dry periods good. Shinseiki is better in my opinion, but it needs a pollinator. Shinko fruits without a pollinator, but much more fruit with a pollinator. Shinko does get blight....I lost mine after about 8 years due to blight....it was bad that year. I replaced my shinko with Tennosui. First time fruiting last year. Was not impressed with fruit. Mine were not crisp and low flavor. Tree may still be too young. I prefer crisp pears and my favorite is Southern Queen, sweet, flavorful and crisp. I may replace my Tennosui with it's sister, Southern King if the fruit don't improve. The Akers (acres) Home pear is very good. It is excellent flavor and sweetness after a week or two off the tree. No problems with blight, but it does have rot problems. You may have to spray.....don't know about San Antone. I think the rot problem may be why it is not pushed much anymore here, but it is excellent. I pulled mine due to rot and it is a melting pear and I like crisp.

8-29-2015 I am by Oxford Wisconsin,I try to keep my 100-150 Large Korean Asian Pear tree's fruit on the tree to 28-26degrees 28 they for sure won't freeze & really color & sugar up nice.My Chojuro taste like Butterscotch (rum), I wish when I planted 100 nijisseiki that they would have been Chojuro, Niitaka tastes sugary & has a nice size, just planted 45 yoinashi, 45 hosui, 45 atago. Spray your tree's early with Bonide copper fungicide to kill over wintering bacteria, I'm going to be using Kocide 3000,Kocide 3000 doesn't leave a copper build up in the soil and keeps your soil healthier, if you use agristrep during bloom time to fight off firelight you take the chance of mutating the bacteria .I have sprayed agristrep to the fresh cut limb when trying to shut down fireblight so it was absorbed into the cambium layer,I have done this in some instances when I cut the whole tree just above the graft to shut down fireblight & now have a 12-15 foot Large Korean ,when I read winter sunburn I believe the black if that's what your looking at is fireblight, you need to get ahead of this before the sap starts moving up & down the tree when the snow melts. If you still see black under the bark when your cutting out fireblight then cut back even further. Always put up to 10% bleach 90% water in a spray bottle & spray your cutter or saw & let this flash off the bacteria for 30 seconds before moving to another tree don't walk the disease through your orchard no matter how large it is! Thanks. NASHI Westfield Wisconsin (Adams County Nursery Of Aspers )get your catalog & buy with friends or yourself for better pricing & size by caliper & you can mix varieties ,or look online

Rina, The only work I did on this tree was thinning fruits. Too many fruits will snap the branches. I try to graft a new variety anywhere to balance the tree structure. Pear is one of the easiest tree to graft. I choose my varieties from the USDA Corvallis. Scion woods are free and just have to pay for Fedex shipping. They asked you for a reason to obtain the scion woods and I usally told them for a cold hardy trail in Zone 5. In about 5 years then I email them the results. Tony Here is a link that might be useful: USDA / Corvallis

bananas, I'm sure you've seen those callery pears(Bradford and other named selections of its ilk) in residential settings that, at somewhere between 10 and 20 years of age fall apart, as if you'd set off a grenade right in the center of the trunk where all the myriad branches(with acute angles and included bark) originate. Same thing happens when you start re-working a 10-yr old callery with scions of fruiting selections; if you don't address the essential structural problems of Bradford, you're in for trouble. I have a number of fruiting pears on seedling callery (and callery with OHxF 513 interstem), and anticipate no problem with them. I don't disagree with Mr. Callahan. I have recommended to certain persons that they go to one of the big box stores, buy a nice vigorous Bradford, Cleveland, Aristocrat, etc., pear and rework all branches to fruiting varieties. If you do it early enough in the callery's life, there's no reason that it shouldn't have a comparable lifespan to any other fruiting pear.