Subject: Re: Pawpaw Trees

From: [email-masked] (Matthew Shugart)
Date: Tue, 30 Apr 1996 12:45:33 -0800

Paw paws have just started to get some attention on the west coast.  THe
magazine of the California Rare Fruit Growers has an article on paw paws
in its latest issue.  Sunset had a brief report in its April issue (or
maybe it is the May issue)

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From: [email-masked] (Peter Benjamin Sharvy)
Date: 30 Apr 1996 18:20:57 -0700

The Latin name is Asimina triloba

This info is exported from the Hypercard stack "Fruits & Nuts 3.1"

Like banana, the delicate custard flavor is easily destroyed by cooking. 
Pawpaws can be substituted for bananas in most recipes, and are unusually 
(for a fruit) high in protein. The fruit is highly perishable due to its 
thin skin. The inner bark is fibrous and Native Americans once used it 
for rope and cloth. The tree is probably a good candidate for slopes: it 
needs well-drained soil, a long taproot helps reduce erosion, and the 
flowers point downward (nice if you're situated on the downside). The 
pawpaw is the larval food plant of the zebra swallowtail butterfly.

Long, droopy leaves, somewhat reminiscent of magnolias, change to yellow 
in the fall; flowers are purple and drooping. The fruit is oval, ranging 
>from  three to six inches long, and from eight to twelve ounces. The skin 
is green when unripe, yellow or purplish when ripe. Pawpaws become a 
thicket if left  unpruned.

Soil pH from 5.0 to 7.0 is acceptable. Bare-root paw-paws prefer to be 
planted in spring, and must have shade as saplings. The flowers interest 
bees not a whit (hand pollination, with an artist's paintbrush, will 
improve productivity). Supposedly, deer show no interest in the twigs or 
foliage. Pawpaws grow roughly true to seed: the seeds need to be 
stratified at sub-40 F temperatures for 90-120 days (don't let them dry 
out). The organism spends the first two months after germination 
developing a nearly foot-long taproot, after which which it sends up a 
shoot. Because its roots are brittle and the taproot long, pawpaws are 
very difficult to transplant.

The pawpaw is native to the region of the United States roughly east of 
Nebraska, from Michigan to northern Texas and Florida. It bears the 
largest fruits of any North American plant, and was being cultivated by 
Native Americans of the Mississippi valley when Hernando de Soto explored 
the region in the 16th century. The papaya, a completely different plant, 
is occasionally called a "pawpaw" in horticultural literature. The pawpaw 
has a fan club:
   The PawPaw Foundation 
   P.O. Box 23467
   Washington, DC 20026 
   (202) 484-1121.
   Membership is $15 annually (as of 1995).

 Fairchild: early ripening.
 Mitchell: large fruit with top flavor.
 Overleese: late-ripening and flavorful with large seeds.
 Sunflower: self-fruitful, late blooming and ripening.
 Taylor: productive and tasty.
 Wells: very large fruit.
-- 
"Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, who permits the forbidden."
--Rabbi Shabbetai Zevi 1626-?