Bartlett Pear

The most widely grown pear variety in North America, known for its classic pear shape, smooth texture, and sweet, musky flavor. Bartlett pears turn from green to golden yellow as they ripen and are the standard variety for canning. Pick them when still firm and ripen at room temperature for the best smooth, buttery texture.

Bartlett pear seeds can be grown but will not produce true-to-type trees. Extract seeds from ripe fruit, clean thoroughly, and stratify in moist peat at 33 to 40 degrees Fahrenheit for 60 to 90 days. Sow one-half inch deep in seed-starting mix under bright light. Germination takes two to four weeks at 65 to 75 degrees. Pear seedlings grow slowly in their first year and are commonly used as rootstock. Seedling trees may take eight to twelve years to produce their first fruit.

The Season Plate

Your Bartlett Pear Year

Composed for Zone 7 · typical seasons · frost passes Apr 2, returns Nov 1

Sow Bartlett Pear Mar – Apr, pick Aug – Sep. Set your climate below and every date on this plate re-times itself.

Sowing window

Mar – Apr

re-timed to your frost dates

Plant out

after Apr 2

once frost risk has passed

First picking

around Mar 14

≈ 730 days from sowing · 87 or per plant

Composed for —ColdTemperateMildWarmUse my locationUsed once to set your season · only the zone is kept

Week-by-week Bartlett Pear reminders watering, feeding and pruning, timed to your dates

In the app

Frost alerts for your garden a warning before a cold night costs you the crop

In the app

Succession sowing dates so the picking never gaps mid-season

In the app

Prefer email? Get monthly reminders in the Almanac

Keep my dates — free for 7 daysWe nudge you as each window opens · cancel anytime

Plant Bartlett pear trees in early spring in full sun with deep, well-drained soil. Bartlett trees are vigorous, upright growers that benefit from training to an open center or modified central leader system. Space standard trees 20 to 25 feet apart or dwarf trees on quince rootstock 12 to 15 feet apart. The trees establish quickly and may begin fruiting within three to four years.

Bartlett requires a pollination partner as it is not self-fertile. Excellent pollinators include Bosc, Anjou, and Comice, but avoid pairing with Seckel as they are cross-incompatible. Bartlett blooms mid-season with heavy, reliable flower production. Thin fruitlets to one or two per cluster when they reach marble size to improve fruit size and prevent branch breakage from heavy crops.

Pear trees are generally lower maintenance than apples but are highly susceptible to fire blight, which is the primary management concern. Avoid excessive nitrogen that promotes the succulent growth targeted by fire blight bacteria. Water consistently, providing one to two inches per week during the growing season. Prune during winter to maintain structure and airflow. Bartlett trees can live and produce for over 100 years with proper care.

Plant garlic and chives around Bartlett pear trees to help deter pear psylla and borers. Marigolds attract beneficial insects and repel nematodes. White clover planted between rows fixes nitrogen and supports pollinator populations. Avoid planting near juniper species that can harbor pear rust. Comfrey makes an excellent dynamic accumulator for mulch under pear trees, mining potassium and calcium from deep soil layers.

The Society Table

Garlic belongs beside it. Walnut Tree doesn't.

Old growers' knowledge, checked against Bartlett Pear's real companion table below — test any plant you're growing.

Grows well in the company of · 3

GarlicChivesMarigold

Keep apart · 1

Walnut Tree

Plant Bartlett Pear with good neighboursThe planner flags conflicts before they're in the ground

Bartlett pears grow best in deep, well-drained loamy soil with a pH of 6.0 to 7.0. They are less tolerant of heavy clay than apple trees and require good drainage to prevent root diseases. Apply a moderate amount of balanced fertilizer in early spring, but keep nitrogen levels conservative to minimize fire blight risk. Excessive vigor makes trees more susceptible to bacterial disease. Mulch with compost to maintain soil moisture and fertility.

Ideal Temperature

Hardiness Zone Compatibility

Bartlett pears must be picked when mature but still firm and green, then ripened off the tree for best quality. Harvest when the fruit stem separates cleanly from the spur with a gentle upward tilt. If left on the tree to ripen, the flesh becomes gritty and mealy from the inside out. After picking, refrigerate for two to three weeks to initiate the ripening process, then bring to room temperature where they will soften and turn golden yellow within four to seven days.

Storage & Preservation

Bartlett pears store for one to two months in the refrigerator at 30 to 32 degrees Fahrenheit. They are the premier canning pear, maintaining excellent texture and sweet flavor through the canning process. They also make outstanding pear butter, dried pear slices, and pear sauce. For freezing, peel and slice into sugar syrup or ascorbic acid solution before packing.

Troubleshooting Common Problems

Fire blight is the most serious threat to Bartlett pear trees and can kill entire limbs or the whole tree in severe outbreaks. The variety is highly susceptible, requiring careful management of fertilization and pruning. Pear psylla is a persistent insect pest that causes honeydew dripping and sooty mold. Fruit that ripens on the tree develops gritty stone cells, so proper harvest timing is critical. Bartlett is incompatible with Seckel for cross-pollination.

Growing Tips

1. Plant Bartlett pears in a position receiving full sun for at least six to eight hours daily — insufficient light reduces fruit size, sugar accumulation, and the intensity of the variety's signature musky aroma at ripeness. South- or south-west-facing slopes are ideal, and the gentle air drainage they provide also reduces frost pocket risk during the critical bloom period.
2. Bartlett is partially self-fertile but produces dramatically heavier and more consistent crops when cross-pollinated by a compatible variety such as Bosc, Anjou, Comice, or Seckel, all of which bloom at similar times. Plant a confirmed pollinator within 50 m (160 ft) of your Bartlett tree if space allows, or graft a scion of a compatible variety onto an existing branch of the Bartlett tree to guarantee pollination in a small garden.
3. Bartlett pears are highly susceptible to fireblight (Erwinia amylovora), particularly during warm, humid spring weather when temperatures rise above 18 °C (65 °F) during bloom. Reduce risk by avoiding high-nitrogen fertiliser applications in spring, which drive the soft, succulent growth most susceptible to infection, and by pruning out any wilting, shepherd's-crook-tipped shoots promptly, cutting at least 30 cm below visible symptoms and sterilising tools between cuts.
4. Harvest timing is critical with Bartlett and the most common source of disappointment for home growers. Bartlett pears ripen from the inside out — a fruit that looks and feels perfectly firm on the outside may already have a mealy, broken-down core. Use the lift-and-twist test from mid-July onward: if a pear separates from the spur with a gentle half-turn, it is ready. Never wait for the skin to turn fully yellow on the tree.
5. After harvesting, store Bartlett pears at 0 °C (32 °F) in a cool room, refrigerator, or cellar with high humidity for up to six to eight weeks. To ripen for eating, transfer fruit to a room-temperature environment and allow two to five days. A ripe Bartlett will yield to gentle thumb pressure near the stem and emit a strongly sweet, musky fragrance — at this point it should be eaten within 24–48 hours as the window of perfection is brief.
6. Bartlett pears respond very well to training as espaliers or fans against a warm, sheltered south-facing wall or fence. Wall training extends the effective growing season by reflecting additional heat and light onto the fruit, improves air circulation (reducing scab and brown rot), makes pruning, thinning, and harvesting far easier, and allows Bartlett to be grown successfully in climates slightly too cool for reliable open-ground cropping.
7. Consistent fruitlet thinning in early summer is the single most important cultural practice for producing large, premium-quality Bartlett pears and for preventing the biennial bearing cycle. Thin to one fruit per spur cluster, spaced 10–15 cm apart along each branch, removing thinnings by hand rather than by snipping to avoid damaging adjacent fruitlets. Thin early — by mid-June at the latest — for maximum benefit to final fruit size.
8. Bartlett pears prefer a deep, fertile, well-drained loam or sandy loam with a soil pH of 6.0–6.5. They are moderately sensitive to waterlogged conditions, which predispose roots to Phytophthora root rot. If your soil is heavy clay, plant on a slight mound or raised bed, incorporate copious organic matter and grit before planting, and choose a rootstock with good tolerance of wet soils such as OHxF 87 or OHxF 97 rather than quince-based rootstocks, which are more sensitive to both waterlogging and iron-deficiency chlorosis on alkaline soils.
9. Apply a 7–10 cm deep mulch of composted wood chip, well-rotted manure, or garden compost annually in late winter or early spring, extending from 15 cm away from the trunk out to and slightly beyond the drip line. This single practice conserves critical summer soil moisture, suppresses weeds that compete for nutrients, moderates soil temperature extremes, and gradually builds the soil organic matter levels that support the deepest root systems and most productive, longest-lived trees.
10. If codling moth has been a recurring problem, combine pheromone monitoring traps (installed from early spring) with targeted applications of Bacillus thuringiensis var. kurstaki or spinosad at egg hatch — timed using degree-day models from the first recorded adult moth catch — to protect the developing fruit without broad-spectrum insecticide impacts on beneficial insect populations including the bees essential for pollination.