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For most of the year the White Pear is a background tree, a neat dense crown of glossy dark green leaves with slightly wavy edges. Sprays of small white flowers open in spring and early summer, lightly scented, busy with bees.
The fruit is what you plant it for. Each one is a shiny black drupe with a bright scarlet fleshy aril wrapped around one side, so it reads as a black bead sitting in a red cup. A mature tree carries thousands at once. The lopsidedness is in the name: dimidiata means halved.
Mousebirds, barbets, bulbuls and African olive pigeons all feed on them, and trogons do in the eastern forests. They also do the tree's seed dispersal, which is why White Pears turn up scattered along forest margins rather than growing in stands.
The pale, fine-grained timber went into furniture, wagon-building and tool handles. Roots and leaves both have a place in traditional medicine, roots for intestinal complaints and leaves for inflammation of the ear. The Afrikaans name, witpeer, and its English equivalent both come from the pale timber's resemblance to the wood of a true pear tree, not from the fruit or flowers, which look nothing alike.
Full sun or dappled shade both suit it, which makes it useful for an awkward corner. Water well while it settles in, then cut back. It is moderately drought hardy but does better with some moisture. Prune only to shape a young tree. Drainage matters more than feeding.
The roots are well behaved, so you can plant it close to paving, walls and parking areas. It works as a small shade tree, a screen, or the centre of a bird garden.
We plant White Pear across five of our sites, Uilenkraal, Mistbelt, Heartland, the Garden Route Botanical Garden Forest Plot, and Khoinania, as a reliable, adaptable species suited to forest margins and a wide range of soil conditions. Though slower to establish than our fastest pioneers, it earns its place for the long term: its fruit is a serious draw for birds, and because those same birds disperse its seeds, White Pear naturally spreads out along forest edges over time, helping each site's forest margin fill in on its own well beyond wherever we first planted it.
A Tree Card funds real tree planting in one of Greenpop's restoration projects. Browse our full range of designs, for any occasion, and find the right one for you.
