Perry pear
Gregg’s Pit
A Herefordshire perry pear named after the Much Marcle holding where the original tree still stands, and one of the few perry pears whose parent tree can be visited.
Also written Greggs Pit, Gregg’s Pit Pear.
- Classification
- Medium sharp — Perry pear classification
- Harvest
- Mid (Late September to mid October)
- Single varietal
- Established as a single-varietal cider
- Blend role
- Acid lift, Aroma, Vintage quality
- Origin
- Gregg’s Pit, Much Marcle, Herefordshire
- Species
- Pyrus communis
- Flowering
- Mid flowering band
- Vigour
- Very vigorous — a large tree that takes years to settle to cropping
- Biennial bearing
- Markedly biennial — heavy and light years alternate
- Keeping
- Poor — mill soon after picking
- Evidence
- Analysed in 2 sources, watched at 1 trial site
How it is classified
Perry pear classification
Medium sharp
Moderate acid with low to moderate tannin.
Moderate acid with light to moderate tannin. The cultivar has a working reputation among makers that rests on the perry rather than on any published analysis.
Every classification on CiderHQ names its system. Why there is more than one.
What it contributes to a blend
A direction, not a measurement. These bands are the level of resolution the evidence supports, and they say which way adding this fruit pushes a blend rather than what the finished drink will be.
| Axis | Typical | Range |
|---|---|---|
| Acid | High | |
| Tannin | Moderate | |
| Sugar | Moderate | |
| Bitterness | Slight | |
| Astringency | Noticeable | |
| Aroma | Pronounced | |
| Body | Medium |
Maker and collection description of a moderately sharp, lightly tannic and aromatic juice; no published analysis has been verified. These bands were authored from description; published analyses of this fruit have since been transcribed onto the record from named trial programmes and are shown above. The bands are not derived from those figures, which is why this profile is marked as classified rather than measured.
A moderately sharp juice with light grip and a distinct aromatic character, giving a perry with more definition than most Herefordshire fruit of its class.
Aroma
No aroma descriptors are recorded for Gregg’s Pit. Perry pears have been described far less than they have been analysed, and much of what a perry smells of is produced by the fermentation rather than carried in by the fruit. CiderHQ publishes the absence rather than filling the space with descriptors nothing supports.
Measured analysis
Each figure is shown with where and when it was taken. They are not averaged: the same cultivar grown in another climate genuinely gives different numbers, and collapsing them into one would be the most misleading thing this page could do.
| Property | Reading | Where | When | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free amino nitrogen | 42.3 mg/L | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
| Phenolic acids | 130.0 mg/L | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
| Proline | 123.7 mg/L | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
| Sorbitol | 10.0–30.0 g/L | Various growing sites; the literature pools pear juice analyses rather than reporting by orchard | — | Various journals and institute reports |
| Specific gravity | 1.058 SG | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
| Titratable acidity | 4.0 g/L | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
| Total primary amino acids | 222.9 mg/L | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
| Total phenolics | 540.0 mg/L | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
| Total tannin | 410.0 mg/L | Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties, England | 2022Modern analysis | Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell) |
How these were measured
- Juice pressed from fruit collected in the Three Counties and frozen before analysis. Published to five decimal places and shown at the three the site displays.
- Titration, reported as malic acid.
- “True tannin” — the polymerised phenolic fraction, measured separately from the phenolic acids. Published in grams per litre and stored here in milligrams per litre by exact conversion.
- Phenolic acids measured separately from the tannin fraction. Published in grams per litre and stored here in milligrams per litre by exact conversion.
- The sum of the true tannin and phenolic acid fractions as the surveyor reports it. Published in grams per litre and stored here in milligrams per litre by exact conversion.
- HPLC. The survey’s column is the total of the primary (assimilable) amino acids, summed by mass; proline, a secondary amino acid, is reported in its own column and is not included. In eleven of the thirty-seven samples proline alone exceeds this figure.
- Free amino nitrogen, calculated from the individual amino acids as nitrogen available to yeast. Excludes proline.
- HPLC.
- A general pear juice figure rather than an analysis of this cultivar. Recorded here because single-variety Gregg’s Pit perry is made and sold as dry, and the sweetness drinkers report in it is sorbitol rather than residual sugar. The range is not tied to a single study or season.
- One sample from one source in one season. The surveyor reports the same variety differing markedly between years, sites and tree types, and publishes the samples separately rather than pooling them.
- Measured as “true tannin” — the polymerised phenolic fraction — separately from the phenolic acids. It is not a Folin–Ciocalteu total and not a permanganate total, and should be compared only with figures produced the same way.
- Perry pear juice runs far lower in assimilable nitrogen than cider apple juice, a difference the Long Ashton workers reported and this survey confirms across most of the varieties sampled. Several readings here sit below the level at which a ferment is generally expected to need feeding.
- Proline is an amino acid a wine or cider yeast cannot assimilate without oxygen, so it does not count towards usable nitrogen. In these pear juices it routinely exceeds the whole assimilable amino pool, which is why a perry must can be rich in amino acids and starved of nitrogen at the same time.
Where it sits among the varieties each programme measured
| Programme | Property | Gregg’s Pit | Programme median | Position |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Titratable acidity as malic | 4.0 g/L | 5.2 g/L | Above 7 and below 25 of the other 32: lowest quarter |
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Total tannin | 410 mg/L | 630 mg/L | Above 2, level with 1, below 30 of the other 33: lowest quarter |
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Total phenolics | 540 mg/L | 860 mg/L | Above 3 and below 30 of the other 33: lowest quarter |
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Specific gravity | 1.058 | 1.058 | Above 16, level with 3, below 14 of the other 33: upper middle |
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Free amino nitrogen | 42 mg/L | 22 mg/L | Above 28 and below 5 of the other 33: highest quarter |
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Total primary amino acids | 223 mg/L | 136 mg/L | Above 25 and below 8 of the other 33: highest quarter |
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Proline | 124 mg/L | 97 mg/L | Above 21 and below 12 of the other 33: upper middle |
| The Three Counties perry pear survey | Phenolic acids | 130 mg/L | 200 mg/L | Above 5 and below 28 of the other 33: lowest quarter |
Compare within a study to see where these figures sat among the other cultivars the same work analysed — which is a more robust statement than the figures themselves, because absolute values move between laboratories and the ordering inside one study mostly survives.
Watched in the orchard
What named research programmes recorded about this fruit at their own sites. Bloom, harvest and cropping belong to a place and a run of seasons rather than to a cultivar, so they are reported site by site rather than merged.
Three Counties perry pear juice survey
Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and neighbouring counties — the perry country itself, rather than a research station elsewhere · 2022–2024 · Cider and Perry Academy (Peter Mitchell)
The lower Severn and Wye vales: mild, wet, and the only ground in Britain where perry pears have ever been grown at scale. Fruit was collected across three autumns, and the survey reports each collection separately rather than pooling the seasons.
- Held as
- Sample GP-Oct22
Juice from single varieties, frozen before analysis. Specific gravity; titratable acidity by titration as malic acid; “true tannin” and phenolic acids measured as separate fractions; individual amino acids by HPLC, with free amino nitrogen calculated from them and proline reported apart because yeast cannot assimilate it anaerobically. Where samples differed by location, tree age or year, they are reported separately.
In the orchard
- Harvest window
- Mid
- Flowering
- Mid flowering band
- Vigour
- Very vigorous — a large tree that takes years to settle to cropping
- Cropping
- Markedly biennial — heavy and light years alternate
- Keeping
- Poor — mill soon after picking
Late September into October, with the usual short window. The National Perry Pear Collection records it ripening in the first half of October at Hartpury, which agrees with the window recorded here.
Mid-season. Self-incompatible. The National Perry Pear Collection places it in the mid flowering band, from flowering records kept over many seasons.
Pears are not self-fertile. A variety needs another in blossom at the same time to set fruit, which is why the flowering band matters more in a perry orchard than the harvest window does.
Ripening moves with the site and the season. Where the National Perry Pear Collection’s observation at Hartpury falls in a different band from the window recorded here, both are kept rather than one overwriting the other.
Disease and pest susceptibility
| Issue | Susceptibility | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Pear scab | moderate | — |
| Self-incompatibility | high | — |
Juice and pressing
- Moderate acid with light tannin
- Aromatic
- Ferments cleanly
How it is used
- Made as a single-variety perry at the holding it is named for, and elsewhere in Herefordshire.
- Blended where a maker wants acidity and aroma together.
On its own
Established as a single-varietal cider
One of the perry pears most reliably encountered as a named single-variety perry. Where it is sold as dry, the sweetness a drinker notices is sorbitol, not residual sugar, and that distinction is worth making on a back label.
About Gregg’s Pit
Gregg’s Pit is named after a holding at Much Marcle in Herefordshire, and unlike almost every other perry pear in this file the place can be found and the tree it is named for is still standing. That matters more than it sounds. Perry pear origins are ordinarily parish tradition attached to a name whose referent has vanished; here there is an orchard, a veteran pear tree of great age, and a continuous association between the two.
The pear gives a moderately sharp juice with light tannin and a distinct aromatic character. Among Herefordshire medium-sharp pears that combination is uncommon enough to have earned it a working reputation with makers, and it is one of the small number of perry pears a drinker is likely to encounter named on a bottle rather than blended anonymously.
It also illustrates the sorbitol point clearly. A single-variety Gregg’s Pit perry can be fermented to complete dryness by the yeast and still be described as sweet by people drinking it, which is not a fault, a back-sweetening or a stopped ferment. It is the sugar alcohol the yeast cannot use, and it is present in every perry ever made.
The old trees at the site are the other half of the record. A standard perry pear can live for two or three centuries and reach fifteen metres, and a veteran specimen is a substantial living structure supporting mistletoe, lichens, invertebrates and hole-nesting birds. Traditional orchards of this kind are a recognised priority habitat in the United Kingdom, which is a fact about biodiversity before it is a fact about drink.
Names, origin and identity
Cultivar naming is the hardest problem in cider fruit data. The same tree carries different names across ten miles, and two different trees have shared a name for two centuries.
Origin · traditional account
Named for the holding where the tree was found and where a very old specimen survives. The place is identifiable, which is rare; the raising of the tree is not documented, which is not.
Why it matters
- One of very few perry pears whose original tree can still be identified and visited, in an orchard at Much Marcle in Herefordshire.
- A demonstration that a perry pear orchard is a piece of landscape history: the veteran trees on the site predate every building and every boundary around them.
Related cultivars
Recorded relationships, including the ones this fruit is routinely confused with.
Fruit that plays a similar part
Cultivars sharing a classification under the same system and a comparable role in a blend. Not a similarity score — a stated relationship.
Hendre Huffcap
The most highly regarded of the Huffcap group of perry pears, taking its first name from a Monmouthshire farm and its second from a word for a drink strong enough to lift a hat.
Blakeney Red
The most widely planted perry pear of the Three Counties, taking its name from the Gloucestershire village of Blakeney and grown for perry, for canning and, during the First World War, for dye.
Moorcroft
An early Malvern-country perry pear, known as Malvern Hills as often as by its own name, and at the centre of one of the sharpest identity disputes in perry.
Stinking Bishop
A Dymock perry pear named after a nineteenth-century grower called Bishop, and now better known through the washed-rind cheese that is bathed in its perry.
Thorn
One of the oldest named English perry pears, recorded in the seventeenth century and still valued for a quick, light perry that is ready before most others.
Burgundy
A deeply coloured Monmouthshire perry pear, one of the Welsh cultivars located and propagated by survey work after being reduced to a handful of trees.
Where it grows
What people ask next
Questions readers ask about the things this page mentions. Each one goes to the section that answers it rather than to a page written to receive the question.
- What is perry — Perry is an alcoholic drink made by fermenting the juice of pears, traditionally of specific perry pear cultivars rather than eating pears. It is to pears what cider is to apples, and has its own history in the three counties of England and in Normandy.
- Are cider orchards good for wildlife — Traditional orchards can be, and are recognised as a priority habitat in the United Kingdom: old standard trees carry deadwood, and the grassland beneath is often unimproved. A dense modern bush orchard managed intensively is a different proposition.
- How are apples milled for cider
- How is sparkling cider made
- When are cider apples harvested — In the northern hemisphere the cider harvest runs from about September to November, with late bittersweets such as Dabinett and Vilberie coming in last. Cider fruit is generally picked riper than dessert fruit, and often gathered from the ground.
- How are perry pears classified — Perry pears are conventionally divided by acid and tannin into sweet, medium sharp, bittersharp and bittersweet, following the scheme used in the English perry literature. Sorbitol content matters too, and it does not appear in the classes.
Where to go next
- How cider apples are classified — Why there are four schemes and none of them is universal.
- The blend explorer — See which way changing the proportions moves a blend.
- Blending — What a cider maker is actually deciding when they build a blend.
Sources
What this page rests on. Where a source is marked as registered rather than read, CiderHQ is recording that the body is authoritative on the subject without claiming to have worked through the document itself. See our evidence policy for what each state means.
National Perry Pear Centre, Hartpury · specialist organisation · passage verified 2026-08-24
Read on 2026-08-24 — and the address CiderHQ had registered, perrypears.co.uk, is no longer the Centre at all. It fails the TLS handshake over https, and over plain http it resolves to a Sedo domain-parking page: an earlier check recorded it as retrieved on the strength of an HTTP 200, which was wrong, and the correction is the point. The Centre publishes at nationalperrypearcentre.org.uk. It is the closest thing British perry has to an identity authority: it holds at least two examples of most known varieties, states that the DNA of most of them has been determined and is used as an aid to identification, and publishes a variety register with synonym lists. Its 121-variety register is transcribed into the perry pear records, including the nineteen names it shows being claimed by more than one variety.
Three Counties Cider and Perry Association
TCCPA · specialist organisation · retrieved 2026-08-24
Traditional Orchard Habitat Inventory and orchard loss surveys
People’s Trust for Endangered Species / Natural England · specialist organisation · retrieved 2026-08-24
Opened on 2026-08-24. The traditional orchard campaign pages were reached and confirmed, but the orchard-loss figures CiderHQ wants from this body sit in survey outputs rather than on the campaign page, and have not yet been located.
Research on pear juice composition and sorbitol in perry
Various journals and institute reports · peer-reviewed literature · registered as competent for this subject
The evidence base for the single most important chemical difference between cider and perry: pears carry substantial sorbitol, which yeast does not ferment, so a fully fermented perry retains sweetness a fully fermented cider cannot.
Research Evidence standard for this record. What that means.