Cannon Hall Walled Garden Historic Pear Collection
11th September 2025
Cannon Hall will be celebrating the annual Pear Day in the walled garden on 21st September.
Pears have been grown for thousands of years and are considered one of the most exciting of all tree fruits, resulting in the cultivation of more than 3,000 varieties worldwide. There are around 550 varieties that will grow in the UK.
In the past, a good orchard would grow a wide variety of pears so that fruit was available most of the year round. They were grown as an eating or dessert pear picked in the summer whilst pears which fruited later in the year were used for cooking and preserving. A mixture of left over pears and small tough pears are ideal for wine making, pear juice or perry (pear cider).
Pear trees have been grown in the walled garden at Cannon Hall since the 1600’s and there are currently 34 different varieties. These have been grafted onto the rootstock of quince trees to keep them from growing too large for the garden. Some of the names, like the Conference pear, will be familiar, but there are others with more wonderfully exotic names like Swan’s Egg, Jargonelle and Beurre d’Amanlis.
The trees are grown in the walled garden to provide shelter from harsh weather and, in the past, the walls would have been heated to ensure that the flowers did not get frost damaged. Most of the trees are grown espalier style against the wall, an attractive gardening technique that originated in Roman times that involves training them to grow against a surface.
The pear trees at Cannon Hall have been celebrated in a 2019 exhibition ‘Pears and Apples’ based on the beautiful botanical illustrations of Elisabeth Dowle, some of which were turned into Barnsley Museum online jigsaws which are still available here
Pears & Apples – © Copyright Elisabeth Dowle all rights reserved
There is also a beautiful special edition Moorcroft vase featuring the pears and walled garden on display in Cannon Hall Museum, designed by Sian Leeper in 2007.
You can also remember a loved one or simply the fact that you love to visit Cannon Hall by adding a pear to the Celebration Tree in the walled garden. In doing so, you will help raise funds to help the gardens grow. For further information, message info@bmht.org
