My farm-ette, Grandpas place, had an orchard, and all that remains is an old old old pear tree. Its trunk & main branches are a disaster, hollowed out big time, but it still hangs on even though there were two volunteer maple trees on either side blocking it out. Well I cut those two maples trees down and voila the tree perked up. A lot of shoots coming from almost ground level off the trunk. Even the old branches have new sprouts. However, this tree is doomed. One o the main branches fell the other day. I was thinking,...when it goes dormant, cut down the tree just above where the new shoots have come out, thin those shoots out to the best two perhaps, and let them become the new tree. Sound idea?
Better sense tells me to just cut the bugger down, but I am a bit sentimental and would like to keep this tree going, after all, a "survivor" like this should be given every opportunity.
Thoughts?
Check on the sprouts that are coming out. They might not be the same variety as the main tree. They might even be obviously quince shoots rather than pear, as you might be able to tell from the leaf shape. You can graft to those and have the mostly hollow trunk fade away. As the new grafts will probably take a few years to develop fruit, I wouldn't cut away the "old tree" until the new variety is producing.
John S
PDX OR
Hey Tom, another good question 
I’d inherited a similar situation decades ago.. And though heroic attempts were made to save & salvage trees in similar condition, most were eventually replaced…
My first thought, too, was to graft onto, or nurture one of it’s many shoots. But as John mentioned, they may be rootstock, and not pear. But my main concern is the fact there’s so much dead & decaying material associated with the tree, often disease or insect activity will keep them from ever flourishing.
With those I’d attempted to salvage, the problem appeared to be underground. With the massive root system that once fed the pear, for example, no longer being fed a sustainable amount of energy from a large healthy tree, it will decay, and likely already has. And whatever is now working to break down it’s rotting root structure is waiting and likely capable of damaging even new growth from the same…
So, I agree with Jafar’s suggestion of collecting some scions this winter and grafting (or have grafted at the HOS Spring Event) a couple replacement trees. That would give you a viable link to the variety, you already know the drill for establishing new trees (another thread), and if you don’t care for the pear itself, graft it over to another variety or two…
After much work in an orchard full of giants, pruning, thinning, spraying or harvesting 30 feet up a rickety old tree didn’t seem all that smart, to me. It’s tuff to take em down ...but when you can put 3 or 4 young productive trees of a variety you may really want in their place, including a ‘new version’ of them, it’s probably a better plan.
Idyllwild
simplepress
jafar
Marsha H
Viron
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