I don’t understand why you want to root any pear. Pear rootstocks (OHxF series and Quince) are cheap and widely available.
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I had 3 particular OHxF root stocks in mind, I looked again and yes 2 are not available online anywhere else as far as I can tell, yet I looked again and one of the ones I wanted I found at Cummins so I do not need to order from grin after all. There are only 3 OHxF root stocks that I found any info on that encourages a larger crop so I wanted one of them. It’s also the best one of the 3 that they have, OHxF 87.
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Yikes…that’s not like him. I figured some folks on this forum would know all that info…just an FYI. I hope things are cool with him and the NCGR.
I just got a note today re: pear scion cutting at Corvallis. It’s tentatively (weather permitting) scheduled for Feb 23…seems like it was earlier last year. I thought I saw somewhere on the website about pear scion orders needing to in before Feb 1.
I have a friend that knows him a little, the impression I get is that they are being way more picky about who to give cuttings too. That they no longer want to give to anyone who will not make their jobs easier, yet it’s not his doing the new rules, too many people were requesting cuttings and they worried that the cuttings were being wasted by people. I learned this last year.
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Hi Alan I handle pear rootstock scions a little different in one of several ways 1.) I use it as an interstem as it’s intended purpose 2.) I graft it on a tree to grow out for seeds 3.) I graft it to a rootstock and bury it past the scion to root the scion but it’s still fed by the roots. Have definately used clonex a lot and for many years. Clonex is expensive but highly effective at rooting cuttings in about 10 weeks. A heat mat will help to root the cuttings faster than 10 weeks and a mister or just a jar turned over the cutting to control humidity is highly effective. Good luck on your rootstock cuttings! I normally don’t root pear rootstock scions but there is nothing wrong with doing that if it achieves your purpose. It would put me one year behind which is why I don’t. If I interstem I can still graft the fruiting scion the same year. Let’s say hypothetically I want “farmingdale rootstock” to graft to so I’m the type that will graft farmingdale to callery and graft magness to farmingdale as an example. By the way Corvallis was faster last year than Geneva at sending scions at my location. It’s an incredible program!
I’ve not gotten any reply yet from my small geneva order but they’ve been rock solid the previous two years I ordered and I have no reason to doubt them this year.
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Got my GRIN order in just before the deadline. After holding out, I finally broke down and requested a Goldrush, even with doubts how well its late ripening will do in my frost pocket in the Finger Lakes. A few nearby orchardists said it has done fine for them. I also ordered a Fall Pippin, which was a favorite of my father and grandfather and highly rated and widely grown in the 19th and early 20th century, but rather rare these days. I’m taking a chance on three German apple varieties, Finkenwarder Herbst Prinz, Halberstadt Jungfernapfel, and Kaiser Wilhelm (aka Peter Broich). The first two have been described as thriving well in cool, moist regions with heavy soils, and that describes our orchard. Kaiser Wilhelm has a great story involving either misidentification or botanical plagiarism, and the kaiser himself called it a truly majestic apple.
Folks really need to stop requesting things available elsewhere from them, they have limited staffing. They are getting more picky every year and I would not be surprised if in a few years all the programs were restricted to commercial interests only.
I think they made a big mistake when they added the “shopping cart” order system, it makes it too easy to order since it feels like any other nursery site.
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I found what I needed at Cummins so I decided to skip ordering at Corvallis. I too was thinking about the delay, that was why I preferred getting a plant from the start.
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Well the system is for much more than Corvallis, and most of what is available through the system are boring things to most people and commercial people would not be interested in them, things that would never get requested without the shopping cart. So for most plants in the system it was not a mistake. It’s just that some universities have way better plants than others, Corvallis has a lot of great plants. Corvallis is like a European bakery and a lot of other universities are like a gas station convince store.
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Yeah, in October he said he wanted to spread the scions about but there were other forces at work…or something like that. It didn’t mean much to me at the time 'cuz if I’m on the volunteer cutting team I cut whatever I want for myself, too. The government being the potentially indifferent behemoth that it can be, just darn near anything could happen for no apparent reason. Now, I’m really hoping that I am on the volunteer scion gathering team this year…gulp. 
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All of my requested scions arrived this morning in fantastic shape (like always) 
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There is a week where I will be out of town. I emailed Dawn and requested mine not to be shipped during that time. She gave me an OK but I hope its not to much trouble.
GRIN always does a bang up job with their scions. They are very long and out of 1 scion you can easily get 3 or 4 grafts.
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Roots and callus both come from the cambium layer but they are not the same. I love the theory because it makes sense. At this site Root callusing in cuttings this is what is said “Root callusing in cuttings
What causes root callusing? Why is it that some in some varieties some of the cuttings root readily while others develop a large amount of callus which prohibits rooting.
Incitement for root production is initiated as soon as a stem is severed from its parent. This is called wound shock.
The first reaction is the formation of callus tissue which protects the wound. Next, roots are produced.
Both the callus tissue and the roots arise from the cambium (layer of actively dividing cells found beneath the bark).
The formation of callus is a necessary preliminary to rooting, although roots do not arise in the callus, but from the cambium immediately behind it.
Rooting is encouraged by moisture, warmth (but the air temperature should be below the that of the soil), good aeration.
Hormones (especially synthetic auxins like IAA, IBA and NAA) assist in the formation of roots, especially when the soil temperature is at least 15ºC.
We guess that the initiation of roots in different cuttings is hormonally controlled and experiments with different hormones and/or different concentrations would be a suitable topic for investigation.“
I do however believe scions unable to root are unable to callus as mentioned in this article Getting to the Root of Regeneration: Adventitious Rooting and Callus Formation
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I am curious what kind of scion is collected in October.
Not sure about scions in October, though maybe some cuttings may be made at that time of the year (?). Out at NCGR-Corv, by late Oct., the Euro pears are mostly gone, but there are still plenty of Asian pears, quinces, some hardy kiwis, fallen pawpaws, some hazelnuts, etc., etc. I’m out there with some HOS people to pick some of that stuff and get the late-Sept-picked pears outta the cooler. The big tasting extravaganza to which all the goodies are going is the following weekend. 
Scion cutting is colder and wetter…in late Feb this year. These are the ones that go out to the world.
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Having talked to a friend who works at the Geneva, I get the sense is that as many requests and demands as they do get for scionwood, overall they wish they were more utilized. When I asked about including a modern variety with heirlooms in my order, my friend didn’t seem to understand why I thought that would be a problem.
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By utilized do you mean more requests? Geneva seems to have a different attitude than the western repositories. It might be good to ask someone there directly so we can have a clear answer.
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