Pawpaws

[JeremyL]

My wife and I just planted 13 pawpaw trees (several varieties). Wondering if anyone else who frequents this tractor board has experience with or interest in growing these native trees?

-JeremyL in Kentucky

 

[RobS]

We had some PawPaw trees where I grew up in central Indiana. I always heard the fruit was edible, but never tried. Have you? If you are a real PawPaw nut, you'll have to visit PawPaw Michigan or PawPaw lake in Michigan. Neither of which will take your breath away /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[njrqs]

Not a huge fan of the fruit but have been known to eat it on occasions.

Grow well here but get easily attacked by fruit fly and flying foxes (large bats)

Dunno if you have them over there but the flying foxes love them and make a horrible mess of any unprotected crops.

Cheers

 

[TerryinMD]

We have lots of them growing in our area.

From my understanding, they do not last long when riped and must be used quickly. The pod is filled with lots of seeds which resemble large kidney beans. Our kids picked a bunch and disbursed lots of seeds on our property. As far as tasting them, do not think that I have.

Like anything else that grows in the the wild, yes you can probably eat it but it has no commercial value. That tells me that one of two things account for that - one, short shelf life (like a white fleshed peach) and two, you need to develop a taste for it.

Terry

 

[MossRoad]

The Indiana Banana!

 

[DarelS]

Where I grew up in NE Arkansas they are native. They are attractive trees, with large leaves. The fruit is a sort of weak banana custard flavor, and there are LOTS of seeds in each pod. The fruit does bruise easily. Dad has been trying to transplant them for years; they have a long tap root that makes them hard to transplant. I remember reading that there is one particular butterfly who's larvae only feed on paw paw leaves (black swallowtail? can't remember). I was never that crazy about the flavor myself, I personally think that about 1 paw paw per year is enough. Mom always made us gather a bunch when they were ripe; they always ended up rotting long before we ate them. Then again, you probably have "improved" varieties.

 

[njrqs]

No commercial value???

They are sold in ALL fruit shops over here. Their seeds are small, like match heads. Or ours are anyway, maybe your are different by the sound of it.

Cheers

 

[MossRoad]

Neil,

Do your Paw Paws look like these? <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.cdr3.com/pawpaw/> Click Here </A>

 

[njrqs]

Nope

Nothing like them. So we are talking different trees then.

Hmm - Why call something the same name but different tree.

They look like mangoes to me.

Our pawpaw trees are real skinny with one trunk and sort of pointy leaves. The fruit is big like a football and yellowy/red in colour.

So we all learn something new everyday.

Remind me not to order pawpaw in the US !!!

Cheers

 

[Devildog]

<font color=blue>The Indiana Banana</font color=blue>

I was LMAO after I read that Mossroad, Being I grew up in the country in central Ind, and we had a million[well not quite that many] of them treses around but never heard it quite called that/w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif.
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Take care, Jim