Amalthea: If I had pear trees that looked as you describe yours, I would be thinking about reducing their height with some serious pruning and doing a little branch spreading. The natural growth habit of most pear trees is straight up, and it's up to the grower to bring that pattern under control. Otherwise you can end up with a 15-20 foot tree, way out of range for effective thinning, picking or spraying, should that be necessary. Even a good orchard ladder will only get you so far. You don't say whether your trees are Asian or European pears, but either way you don't want to leave the pears on the trees until they fall of their own accord. Thinning is important for all pears, but particularly Asians, which tend to heavily overset. I remove more than 90% of the small fruits from my Asian pear trees or they would break branches, even though the fruits would be small individually. Better a smaller but nicer crop of large pears than a lot of throwaways. And when branches break, they are always the ones you really want to keep. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

kimmsr said something that's interesting to me; he waters once a week. I flood irrigate once a week. Most of my beds are 'raised' not by design but because I added so much stuff to them, so when I flood the yard, they don't get inundated. But the soil in the beds does get moist. I keep the soil covered with mulch; straw covered with lots of grass clippings. When I first transplant plants, I water them, but once they are established, they are seldom watered. I have checked the soil to see if it's moist, and usually I can find moisture within three inches of the surface. The plants seem to do fine being watered once a week. I only have trouble where I use just grass clippings. The grass clippings dissolve into the soil, so I need to reapply that mulch to keep the soil covered.

Nat, I don't mean to throw a monkey wrench into your list but I took out Ducher because I could not keep black spot off of it. Thrips loved it and so did the Japanese beetles. It was an underperformer for me, here in Atlanta. Others love it, so thatÂs just my experience. Gruss An Aachen is a great rose but he needs to be sprayed here if you want him to look good--if not, you're going to see a lot more cane. BUT, he does respond well to occasional spraying and he does bloom even when I let him get spotty. BelindaÂs Dream is also nice but does better with some spray. BTW, her blooms are much larger and more impressive in the cooler weather of the spring and fall. Of the ones youÂve listed, Marie Daly is the most disease resistant and has the most continual bloom. The fragrance also carries on the breezeÂwhich I really like. SdLM is another great rose. Mine does get some BS but with a little shot of anti-fungal spray every now and then, she does well. The blooms are beautiful and smell great. Neither SdLM or MD are very large, thoughÂboth maybe 3.5 to 4 feet tall and wide. What about Duchesse de Brabant? SheÂs on JeanÂs list that you mentioned and she made the Earthkind list in Texas. She has beautiful pink blooms that smell like raspberries to me. Mine is taller than wide but I've heard others report that their DdB are larger. I just went out and would call mine "lightly thorny". Although she does have some thorns, it seems like way less than others like her neighbor, Buff Beauty. Hope this information helps. Here is a link that might be useful: Duchesse de Brabant

Oh, goodness, I hope so! If so, that's hilarious because my husband wanted to plant one, but I told him we didn't have room in the sunny areas of the yard.