What happened to the famous East Village (replacement) pear tree on 3rd Avenue?

An EVG reader pointed out that the pear tree on the NE corner of Third Avenue at 13th Street has been removed, likely in the past 10 days.

Per the reader: "I don't know why it was removed, but it had been leaning pretty bad, as seen in the screenshot on Google Street View from 2022."

This wasn't just any pear tree. It was a living testament to our shared history. [Sob] 

In November 2003, the city planted a new tree to commemorate a pear tree that had graced this corner for nearly 200 years ... planted in the mid-1600s by Peter Stuyvesant, the Dutch governor of New Amsterdam.

Unfortunately, the tree met an untimely end. Per Village Preservation: "A collision of two wagons on the corner resulted in one wagon fatally striking the pear tree on February 27, 1867." (Rutherford Stuyvesant, an heir to the fam fortune, later presented a section of the tree to the New-York Historical Society. And it's still there today.)

Bill Van Winkle, president of the Holland Society of New York, told the Times in November 2003: "This pear tree is perhaps the most important symbol in the city of New York of the Dutch colonial heritage. We're very excited about getting it back.''

The 124-year-old commemorative plaque (read its history here) remains on the side of Kiehl's ... aka Pear Tree Place.

The plaque reads: 

"On this corner grew Petrus Stuyvesants' pear tree. Recalled to Holland in 1664 on his return he brought the pear tree and planted it as his memorial by which said he "my name may be remembered." The pear tree flourished and bore fruit for over two hundred years. The tablet is placed here by the Holland Society of New York, September 1890." 

Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, May 1862, via New-York Historial Society