Click on the image below to view an
expanded illustration for this species.
|
General:
Large shrub to tree, 5-15 m tall; branches sometimes with thorn-like leaf-spurs, the twigs and buds becoming smooth; bark fissured, scaly.
Leaves:
Alternate, deciduous, elliptic to egg-shaped, 5-10 cm long, finely blunt-toothed to nearly entire, abruptly short-pointed at the tip, hairy when young, becoming smooth.
Flowers:
Inflorescence a short umbel-like cluster, on a lateral branchlet, of 4 to 12 long-stalked flowers; corollas white, bowl-shaped, the petals 5, egg-shaped to circular, 10-15 mm long; calyces 5-lobed, the lobes triangular, 5 mm long; ovaries inferior; stamens 20-30.
Fruits:
Fleshy pomes (pears), pear- to globe-shaped, 2-4 cm or more long (much larger in cultivated forms), 2-5 chambered, the calyx-lobes persisting, the flesh with grit cells.
Source: The Illustrated Flora of British Columbia
|
