058: Eric Bordelet | Ancient Pears, Chay Tour Part 2

Part 2 with Eric Bordelet

We begin this chat with Eric Bordelet in the ancient pear tree orchard. He lead us into a large green field with low grass. We look out in the distance and see 35 foot (10 meters) high trees ahead. The trees are laden with fruit. The background music is the sound of pears dropping to the ground.

Eric and Ria standing next to one of the larger Ancient Pear trees

Ria’s hand at the graft line of Ancient Pear

This is Part 2 of a two part chat with Eric. Listen to Part 1 here.

There is a skip in his step

Eric walks towards the each giant of a tree, picking up fallen pears as he goes along to hold for a moment and feel it stage of ripening.

Look at the crown of the Ancient Pear tree to the left!

The girth of some of the largest pear trees are much too wide for me to circle with only two arms.

If a knight in full armor came riding into the field on his way to Paris, I would not have been surprised.

It is as if we drank the tea and fell into the rabbit hole rolling back time.

Soon Eric is pointing out the grafts on some of the oldest trees and my sense of normal is thrown even further off balance.

Eric pointing to graft line on Ancient Pear

Unlike the 200 year old apple trees I’ve seen in New England back in the USA, the graft lines on these pear trees are at least 4 feet high. It is as if the tree was sawed off and then perhaps a cleft graft was used.

There is a visible graft line as if the root stock of an ancient pear tree was sawn off and then the new pear tree grafts where attached.