Fear the Pear

Ok, so the title doesn't rhyme. Blame the English language. Anyway, consider this post due warning: do not plant a Bradford Pear tree in your yard. These trees are extremely brittle, and will often lose limbs if not the entire tree during storms. Someone planted a few of these trees in our subdivision in 2000-2001. We had two in our front yard. The big one fell over a few weeks ago, thanks to a big gust of wind. Our smaller tree did not have as much weight to support in the branch structure, so it survived with nary a branch lost. Another storm yesterday morning took out one of my neighbors trees right at the ground. All the other trees of that size in our neighborhood suffered no damage, so the type of tree must be to blame. After moving here I read about this tree's nefarious reputation. But I was hesitant to have the trees cut down, especially since they looked great. Now we are left with an empty spot in our yard, and have to start over with a new tree this fall.