‘Sunrise’ Pear

Abstract

Sunrise' is an early-maturing pear cultivar that combines excellent appearance and fruit quality and good storage potential for an early-maturing pear with resistance to fire blight caused by the bacterium Erwinia amylovora (Burr.) Winsl. et al. (van der Zwet and Beer, 1999). All major cultivars of commercial importance as well as many of those grown by home orchardists are susceptible to this devastating disease, which is endemic to most pear production areas of the northern hemisphere. 'Sunrise' was released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2006. OriginThe original seedling tree of 'Sunrise' originated from a cross of NJ5001710820 • US 446 (Fig. 1) performed in 1965 by H.J. Brooks soon after he revived the USDA pear breeding program initiated by Merton Waite in 1908 (Magness, 1937). It was tested as OHUS 66170-047 and was selected in 1977 from the seedling orchard at the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center in Wooster, OH by R.C. Blake and T. van der Zwet. 'Sunrise' is composed of Pyrus com-munis L. and Pyrus pyrifolia (Burm.) Nakai parentage. The sources of fire blight resistance are the P. communis cultivar Seckel and the P. pyrifolia selection New Jersey 1. Subsequently, 'Sunrise' has been evaluated for fruit quality, fire blight resistance, and productivity in replicated trials of clonally propagated trees at the USDA-ARS Henry A. Wallace Beltsville Agricultural Research Center in Beltsville, MD, the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center in Wooster, OH, and the Appalachian Fruit Research Station in Kearneysville, WV. It is currently being tested or has been tested at eight experiment stations throughout the United States for range of adaptation and productivity under a variety of environmental conditions and management systems.

Inheritance of Resistance to Pear Psylla Nymphal Feeding in Pear (Pyrus communis L.) of European Origin

“…Trees of 'Obican Vodenac' were originally determined to be resistant, but trees labeled with the same cultivar name used in the crosses were subsequently determined to be susceptible, probably as a result of mislabeling at some point in budwood distribution or propagation. 'Sunrise' is a new, high-quality, fireblight-resistant cultivar being used as a parent in the USDA pear breeding program (Bell and van der Zwet, 2011). The number of seedlings assayed varied from 14 to 35.…”