Damn! Had a long post typed, hit submit and it all disappeared so this one will be short but cover the same stuff.
Trimmed this "sucker" off the base of my 30 year old pear tree. It did most of it's growing last year but I ignored it. Went to cut it a couple days ago, this is what I found. The "thorns" appear to be branches off the sucker, which in color and texture is the same as the water sprouts in the tree but the branches are stunted and formed very sharp, hard thorns. Anyone ever see this kind of growth mutation in a fruit tree before?
Yes indeed, it's the root stock so get rid of it as close to the source as possible or you could lose the grafted part that makes fruit. As plants do not have anything like an immune system as we know it, a lot of related plants can be used as rootstocks. There are many plants related to apples, crab apples, medlars, pears & quinces...I don't know which you have there. The plant may have been chosen simply because it can be produced quickly, but sometimes certain plants are used as root stocks because they are resistant to a soil pathogen that the desired plant would be killed by. In the part of CA where I lived, there was something in the soil that attacked & killed English walnuts, so they would graft them onto black walnut rootstock.
I'm thinking in this case they went with the quince, a common one used for pears, because it will tend to "dwarf" the tree. When I bought the tree, it was identified as a "Dwarf Bartlett Pear". Of course, as it turns out, even if they are labelled as a dwarf variety, you need to keep the top trimmed out or they can get pretty darn tall. Mine is above the rooftop now.
I had considered the possibility of grafted root stock. I' had roses revert to root stock before but locust was the only tree I could think of with big thorns. That seemed like such a strange mix though. On @MojoDave s suggestion however, I looked up sour orange. I found no pictures of the thorns but multiple descriptions referred to the use of the root stock for grafting citrus.
The tree is 30 year old Bartlett pear, semi-dwarfed variety nursery stock, I suppose they could have grafted onto anything that would provide a solid foundation. On further research, i found that a common root stock for pears, chosen for dwarfing trait, is quince. Some varieties of quince do have thorns, although not as impressive as these.
I think grafting is the likely source of this growth. Doesn't really matter, I just though it was so odd when I found it.
I think Hawthorns are also related & can be thorny...it's a huge family, really. But I don't think either orange or locust (a legume) would be compatible with malus.
I have black locust at my farm that looks like that.
A suggestion - either draft in an editor then copy and paste or copy before pressing the "Submit Button".
Your alien looks dangerously alien. @Fernapple's suggestion sounds to be on the ball unless you have had those pesky Russians, Ukrainians, North Koreans and Chinese bombarding you with cosmic rays!
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