Forelle’ (Pyrus communis), a late season blushed pear cultivar grown in South Africa, requires a minimum of 12-weeks cold storage (-0.5 °C) to ripen evenly. Mealiness, a dry texture disorder, may develop at this time. In contrast to other pear cultivars, longer cold storage periods result in less mealiness. This could be related to insufficient total ACC build up and ethylene production, during the first 12 weeks of cold storage, for juicy texture development, during ripening. ‘Forelle’ pears were stored for 3 weeks at -0.5°C, treated with ethylene (100 μL L -1 , 24h, 20°C), stored at 20°C for 2 days and thereafter 3 weeks at -0.5°C. Ethylene treatment led to an increase in mealiness after this period. However there were no differences in treated and control fruit following further ripening at 15°C for 7 days. Mealiness could not be linked to insufficient ethylene during shorter storage periods. Harvest maturity, a factor known to influence mealiness, was tested by harvesting fruit 2 weeks prior to commercial harvest, during commercial harvest, and 2 and 4 weeks after commercial harvest. Mealiness occurred at all harvest dates after 6 weeks at -0.5°C and 7 days at 15°C. Storage temperature was also tested as another factor influencing mealiness. Fruit were stored at -0.5°C, 4°C and 7.5°C for 6 weeks and ripened for 7 days at 15°C. Fruit stored at 4°C and 7.5°C ripened with 0 and 8% mealiness, respectively, in contrast to 70% in control fruit. Results could, however, not be confirmed in 2002 and 2003 as all treatments exhibited low mealiness levels (<4%). As high temperatures prior to harvest may influence mealiness, overhead evaporative cooling was applied during 2003 from early fruit development or from 2 weeks prior to harvest. Little to no mealiness developed in all treatments making it difficult to conclude if cooling prior to harvest affects mealiness. INTRODUCTION Texture is a critical feature of pear quality and depends on many factors i.e. time of harvesting, conditions and duration of storage and post-storage ripening as well as climatic factors which are still poorly documented (Zerbini, 2002). ‘Forelle’ is a winter pear with a mandatory 12-week cold storage period (-0.5°C) to ensure even ripening and minimise mealiness (De Vries and Hurndall, 1993). In contrast to ‘d’ Anjou’, ‘Marguerite Marillat’ and ‘La France’ pears, which do not regain their juicy texture after prolonged storage at low temperatures (Chen et al., 1983; Murayama et al., 2002), mealiness of ‘Forelle’ pears decreases with time in cold storage (-0.5°C) (Martin et al., 2003). Insufficient cold storage prior to ripening can cause pears to develop a dry texture (Mitchell, 1990). Low temperatures stimulate ACC-synthase and ACC-oxidase (ACO) necessary for an ethylene climacteric and normal ripening to occur (Lelievre et al., 1997). Exogenous ethylene treatment can compensate for an incomplete cold requirement to initiate ripening (Chen and Mellenthin, 1981) and may improve textural and flavour qualities in pears where the cold requirement has not been satisfied (Mitchell, 1990). However, inactivation of ACO and suppression of ethylene production in nectarines by chilling temperatures was recently shown (Zhou et al., 2000). Pear fruit harvested immature do not reach a climacteric and do not ripen, or ripen unevenly (Ben-Arie and Sonego, 1979). Pears harvested too late often develop a mealy texture (Mellenthin and Wang, 1976).