Wonder if its fireblight? You really need to figure out what the disease is before treating. The fruit probably wasn't sizing up because it lacked leaves. If you take pictures it'll be a lot easier to diagnose.

Hello, I'm in Tennessee, and got interested in trying more pears after Lucky P sent me some "Duchess" scions this past spring. I've done a whole lot of searching and asking and it looks like Magness on quince or a dwarfing stock, is the best route. You get quality fruit with Magness, and pretty good blight resistance, and on a dwarfing rootstock it won't take FOREVER to crop. I looked into the Ledbetter pear, and it's a gritty pear. Lucky says they are "pretty good" but I think I want better. (I have two in pots I don't intend to plant, don't know what to do with them. Also a 'Big Mama' pear. For one thing, apart from not being too fond of grit in my pears, the fact they came from S. AL means they're likely to bloom too early here.) I'm really impressed with what you all are saying about dwarfing stocks slowing growth enough to reduce fireblight strikes. I've ordered quince rootstocks, am only hoping that I don't get anything so blight susceptible it eats up the rootstocks too. As for 'fireblight resistance' it's very much a relative thing. I'm told that the Canadian selections did fine in TN till they began blooming. Corvallis lists a lot of 'resistant' pears that probably will die here, but doesn't consider '20th Century' resistant, and it does fine here. It gets blight, but tends not to die from it. I'm wanting to try Blake's Pride and Shenandoah. I'm not too sure about Potomac, it's been out longer but I don't notice much talk about it. All I can find is quotes of the original press release saying it was the highest quality pear that can be grown in the southeast or something like that. Where are people saying, hey, this is a really nice pear, it did great for me? Donna

Did you have a frost when the flowers were in bud? That could have killed the flowers. Otherwise, the usual points about Bradford Pear - remember it is a very short-lived tree which tends to self-destruct (falls apart, because of the very weak branching) when about 10 years old. Consider planting a replacement tree (of a different species!) now. Resin

I was recently looking into ordering this peony and would like to hear about how others have fared with it as well. There are too few photos and I've heard that it's hard to get established.