I don't suppose anyone has any sprouted paw paw seeds, young seedlings, or small trees they would like to trade / sell?
Thanks,
-G-
Irie Glider,
I was watching a couple of fruits the other day....
Should get round to picking them next week...
Drop me a PM
Respect
Z
I have been thinking about growing paw paws aswell. They look neat and some of them can handle the climate up north here. what do they taste like?
It was brought to my attention that I am giving away my location by referring to "pawpaws" and assuming that it was obvious what I meant. I'm looking for the american pawpaw, Asimina triloba, which I believe is the only Asimina that will survive in my location, along with being the most common.
The taste is quite variable. Everyone of them that I have eaten thus far is a little bit different. Texture sort of like a banana / papaya, flavor really hard to describe. Some people apparently don't like the taste, but I very much enjoyed the few I've eaten.
Ripe seeds are readily available on ebay in the fall. The fruits are available from several online stores. I believe right now there is someone selling potted trees on amazon.com for around $15, and there are a number of other places selling them via mail order / online sales.
I've started several dozen of the seeds (fall 2008). They are pretty straight forward to get started.
Never let them dry out. They should be taken from the fruit and kept moist until planting.
Keep them cold for around 3-4 months. Either put them in plastic bags with moist paper towels in the refrigerator (this is what I've done) or just plant them in large pots and put them outside for the winter.
Once they start to sprout, the large seeds suck up a lot of water. This is where I lost a lot of seeds, as the sprouting seeds sucked the moisture from the paper towels in the baggies, and proceeded to die on me before I realized they were sprouting.
Once outside they are apparently sensitive to direct sun / ultra-violet / drying out / something. I ended up with perhaps 6 or 8 seedlings last year, and it looks like none of them are going to come back up this spring.
I suppose I'll just wait until fall and start the cycle again.
-G-
Irie,
Yeah we don't have these here.
Interesting to find out about another plant though...
Respect
Z
It is a fascinating plant, but probably more so for folks above the 30N parallel (or below the 30S parallel, if it is legal to grow it anywhere there) for whom it is as close to a tropical fruit as is convenient to grow when winters involve feet of snow.
Actually that's not even true. In some places around 30N/S a number of edible banana species can be made to grow without too much fuss.
Yea, they grow natively around here -- very cool plant!
I have considered planting some in a wooded area on our lot (they seem to like fairly deep shade), but they seem like like pretty specific micro-climates, and I don't know if they would thrive or not.
Quote from: "Glider"It is a fascinating plant, but probably more so for folks above the 30N parallel (or below the 30S parallel, if it is legal to grow it anywhere there).........
why would pawpaw be illegal? it's in most of the farm supply seed catalogs.
Quote from: "AliceTepes"why would pawpaw be illegal? it's in most of the farm supply seed catalogs.
Invasive / noxious weed. American pawpaw can spread via clona suckers, I believe. Outside of its native region it might grow quite well (Argentina, New Zealand, Australia) but especially in the case of the island nations, laws protecting the local fauna / flora can be strict.
-G-
I am not sure if it needs a long cold period to germinate the seeds.
There is a pawpaw tree growing in North Florida in Kanapaha Botanical gardens.
The seeds may need cold which wouldn't normally happen under natural conditions outdoors in Florida, but it seems once sprouted they can survive here.
I am thinking the tree has a better chance of surviving in Florida than it would in Wisconsin or Minnesota.
I know it can take cold but not too much cold which is why Michigan I think is the farthest north it grows and even Michigan isn't as cold as Minnesota or Wisconsin.
Believe it or not alot of plants that you find up north will grow in north florida but wont grow in south florida.
Poison ivy, virginia creeper, red maple and others.
Northern Florida such as above Orlando is like the cutoffline for some.
For others even North Florida is too hot like american ginseng wont grow anywhere in Florida.
Pawpaws do need a long(ish) cold period to germinate. However what I understand is that the species is pretty variable. Pawpaws seedlines originating in Florida probably need little or no cold stratification, but probably also are much less likely to over winter in the north. I'm guessing, I don't know.
Glider I think what you are referring to is ecotypes.
This can apply to many plants. There are some Escobaria vivipara( Pincushion Cacti) native to southern Arizona which would never survive in North Dakota while the Escobaria native to North Dakota may or may not survive in southern Arizona.
They are the same species but somehow the genetics is different which favors one climate over the other. They are isolated to some extent but im sure it isnt enough to not allow them to cross and some will survive in the new climate.
If they become too distant over a period of time then they may develop barriers to pollination and become incompatible.
It doesn't matter if they are the same species.
This is where ecology and genetics complement each other.
Provenance is the term used in horticulture. Just like the red maples that grow in Florida can't be grown in Minnesota because they don't go dormant early enough and the ones that grow in Minnesota also wont do well in Florida.
That's the idea. Just like northern ermine mostly turn white, even if raised in the south, and southern genetics ermine tend not to turn white, even if they are born and raised in the Far North. Many food crops tend to prefer one environment over another, so that a strain of tomatoes popular in the southeast may do poorly in the northwest, and vice versa.
Looks like I should have two batches of stratified pawpaw seeds shortly. One is in hand now, sourced from NY state. The other, assuming it gets to me, was sourced from NJ. The seed is perishable, it needs to be planted this spring, it cannot be stored more than another few weeks to a month or two. Germination will be slow, seedlings will not break the surface until late summer or early fall, possibly not until into next year.
-G-
Pawpaws, g-man?
It was six years ago I posted about pawpaws on these boards! I had no idea their true ethnobotanical use then, just a rare dwarf species discovered in a swamp in Florida. Strange to think how this changed my life! Two years later, Prague and the rose hips opened the door that the pawpaw made evident! I should delete this but I
drunk ... Here's to your quest, madness though it is! None for mr this time!!
I had heard that Pawpaw foliage was active but I always thought that was BS.
anyone know of any public chemical analysis of it?
Pick'n up paw paws put'm in yer pocket
pick'n up paw paws put'm in yer pocket
pick'n up paw paws put'm in yer pocket
Way down yonder in the paw-paw patch :blaugh:
peace, ~N~