This seems like a good as place as any to post something I’m very excited about. Several years ago I found a wild paw paw patch and the paw paws it produced were the best ones I’ve ever had. I was told it would be almost impossible to transplant some trees from that patch into my orchard, (long tap root, etc) but I managed to get 2 of them to live. They were only about 18 inches tall so probably 1 to 2 years old. That was 5 years ago, and this is the first time that one of them has set fruit…and it has set a LOT!!! I didn’t hang any rotten meat, just these 2 trees side by side about 18 feet apart. I was worried I had pulled them off the same mother root, which would have made them clones and unable to pollinate each other (I think that is right?) so I’ve always worried if they could help each other produce fruit. Looks like they can!!! Fingers crossed these will taste as good as those from the patch!
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Darn you, now I’m going to have to hike out there and check on that guy! haha. Kidding…I actually appreciate you pointing it out and I am very curious now. Honestly I have never once sprayed any of my paw paws, so its VERY possible. I’ll get back to you! Thanks.
Update/Edit : WHEW! Upon further inspection, I am fairly sure that is NOT a PC scar. Unfortunately I have a good deal of experience with those devils, and as much as it looks like one in the photo, when I looked at it now it just doesn’t look like one at all. Whatever that little spot it, it is actually more of a bump and sticks out from the fruit, and it is also a lot smaller than it looks in the pic. Thanks again for pointing it out, though. Since I’ve never had fruit on my paw paws I don’t know if I should be spraying them or not but I’d rather not, and most of what I read says they have some kind of internal, self-made pesticide. In fact, KSU has looked into whether that substance can be extracted and used as a spray or Genetically implanted into other fruits. So hopefully they won’t need spraying.?.?.
WHile I have some of you Paw Paw people’s attention, let me ask you a serious question. I had 2 three year old paw paws die this year and one is most clearly got something wrong with it. The dead ones were NOT winter kill- they actually started to push green growth this spring and even had a couple blooms on them (even though they are only about 2.5 foot tall). Then all at once the leaves turn brown and were dead. Almost exactly like what happened to my 2 5 year old apricot trees that were about 20 feet away as well as 2 small cherry trees…no idea if that is related but it is strange to have everything in a small area die the same way at about the same time. I 'm pretty sure they didn t get hit with any kind of spray. The drainage for the area is fairly good.
The photo below is a SHOCKING example that you will not even believe. You see, the two papaws shown in this photo are almost twins normally. They were dug up in the wild on the same day 5 years ago and have grown at the exact same rate and always looked identical. What you simply wont believe is that the skeleton (ie the wood before the leaves came out) are almost identical on these 2 trees!!! Just 2 short months ago when they were starting to leaf out, they absolutely looked identical. Same height and same amount of empty “mass” (ie scaffolds/limbs). But holy cow…the photos speak for themselves. Aside from the shocking difference in the photos, what you can’t see is that on the sparse one the leaves actually don’t look awful up close. They look fairly healthy…at least right now they don’t seem to be dying…its like they just stopped growing about 2 weeks after they started.
This one is a big mystery and I doubt anyone can figure out what is going on, but I’m open to idea and guesses!! If nothing else, it is an amazing contrast between an EXTREMELY healthy tree and one that isn’t.
I had that happen to 2 out of 6 grafted Pawpaw trees. In one case the rootstock resprouted from the roots, in the other case the plant was simply dead. I didn’t find an explanation. But from others I heard the mortality rate of young grafted Pawpaws is quite high.
Hi Kevin.
"Almost exactly like what happened to my 2 5 year old apricot trees that were about 20 feet away as well as 2 small cherry trees…no idea if that is related but it is strange to have everything in a small area die the same way’.
This may not pertain to pawpaws but it could be for your cherry trees. Two of my redbud trees died of verticillium wilt. They showed classic symptoms of the wilt.
When my cherry tree (2nd year tree) died. I thought it could be verticillium wilt. That cherry tree was on Krymsk 5. I was told K 5 does not like to be grafted on. I had put 5-6 grafts on it a few weeks before it died. Although I am not sure why my cherry tree died, it would not be surprised it it’s because of v. wilt.
Your statement “it is strange to have everything in a small area die the same way” makes me wonder if what killed them was soil-borne pathogens like v. wilt.
Hey Tippy…when I was talking about my apricot trees that died this year, someone suggested verticillium wilt on that thread and I looked into it some and now that you suggest the same thing, I’ve been googling it again. I think it is VERY likely to be my problem. VERY likely. For one, most of the dead limbs on my dead trees retain a little tuft of leaves at the very tip, and that is reported to be a strong sign of V. Wilt. Tomorrow I will cut into the wood and see if it is discolored- another reported sign. The really bad news is that it sounds like there is nothing to be done once a tree has it, and not much that can be done to prevent a tree from getting it. Good drainage is one, but that is sort of useless…we already know that fruit trees, especially cherry, need good draining and probably everyone -like me- has already done their best to create that. And most of the time if you have a tree planted in an area, there is little you can do to improve the drainage. Other things like keep weeds down, most of us also do. I also read not to plant fruit trees where there was tomatoes, strawberries, or other related plants. There again, by the time I/we get it, its too late-
I hope I don’t sound ungrateful! I very much appreciate your diagnosis and I think there is a good chance you and the other person who proposed it have nailed it. It is just frustrating because it doesn’t sound like there is much I can do to address it!
@carot Thanks for sharing that, Norman. Just knowing I’m not alone helps and hearing your experience helps me discard some wild theories. SInce I got hit by herbicide spray drift a few years ago, everytime something dies I worry that may be the cause again, but there is no other evidence of that in this case and your story reassures me of that. My trees that died were both grafted (unlike the ones in the photo above) so it sounds like this may be more common than I thought. Thanks
Make sure you check for little toothpick-looking sawdust ‘sticks’ that wash off in the rain and tiny borer holes. I hope you don’t have them (and probably don’t), but wilting death of lots of kinds of trees can be from the dreaded ambrosia beetle. Horrible little bugs! They do like pawpaws, and since I had them on my figs last year, I make sure to check my pawpaws very often in case I didn’t nuke every single one. (So far so good.)
More great advice, and thank you. I’ve seen photos of those “sawdust sticks” but hadn’t thought to look for them on my trees. As often and as closely a I look at my trees, I think I’d have seen them but it i certainly worth another close inspection with that in mind! THanks.
I’ve done some digging on my own pawpaw wilting problem after seeing @thecityman’s pics that look exactly like my Potomac pawpaw. This is my largest pawpaw and it fruited for the first time last year. It was perfectly healthy as far as I could tell. Well, this thread got me to look a little closer and there are borer holes spaced fairly evenly up the trunk. I haven’t seen the "toothpick"s, but it’s been raining almost daily here for weeks. Is this ambrosia beetle, and if so , what should I do about it??
Wilted Potomac:
Healthy Shenandoah:
Healthy Mango:
Borer Holes:
I think those holes look too big to be ambrosia. Good news! I don’t know what kind of borer it would be, but chances are you can kill them 
Where did you get the Potomac ?
Any idea how I can kill them? I drove a paper clip into each hole.
I got Potomac from Edible Landscaping. It has been a fast grower for me. Over 6 feet tall at the 3 year mark.
That’s good in case they’re squishable! I’d use a strong systemic for them, in case they are the kind that make galleries and girdle the tree and are hard to treat because of where they are.
Imidacloprid is a common one available for homeowner use. Acetamiprid is still available as Ortho Vegetable Insect Killer but that’s been discontinued, which is sad because it’s less likely to hurt bees!
The imidacloprid for fruit trees as a drench is easily available as a Bayer product, etc. I think I’d use the one I used for plum curculio hits after the fact, tho, because you can spray it on. If you spray the trunk, I’d guess it would do better with borer holes? I’d think so.
That’s this brand’s imidacloprid version. It’s strong!
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B015BSPIJ8/ref=ox_sc_act_title_5?smid=AX6XB8XK2JAWT&psc=1
You might want to shave off a small amount of bark around one of those holes to see what it’s like inside. Galleries or just a hole, etc? But don’t hurt your tree And they recommend fertilizing trees injured by borers to give them more vigor.
I’m just going by what I read, although I do have a gazillion kinds of borers here and do have a certain amount of familiarity with treating them, lol. Ambrosia beetles are the only ones that really, really hurt (last year) but I got rid of them all! Thank God.
@irby This is another product if you have Prime shipping:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00192ANXM/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1
and the Label:
Dax
I have a different problems with persimmons I hope some of you can help me with. I did several grafts this year and quite a few of them are now growing. However, on almost every single graft, the new leaves are all wrinkled and bumpy and strange looking. I’ll get a photo later. It isn’t the kind of wrinkled you see on a dead and dying leaf, they are still perky and green, but really rough all over and a bit like a wadded up piece of paper. THis make any sense to anyone? Any ideas what could cause this? I read there is some kind of persimmon mite but I see no sign of bugs under the leaves. The leaves look a little like peach leaf curl…I know that isn’t the problem but I mention it to try and describe how they look.
@cityman Thrips I’d say. Update: NOT thrips; see messages below.
Thanks. I’m a big fan of ignoring things. haha. Unfortunately that doesn’t always work out well, and these things look bad enough that I am afraid they will endanger my grafts. Here are photos of how bad they look. These are all different grafts. Strangely, the leaves on the tree that are NOT grafts don’t look this way, but every one of the grafts do!
Check for aphids- do you see little tiny jobbers on the underside of leaves?
It’s persimmon psyllids - they like new growth and leave older, tougher leaves alone. I follow cousinfloyd’s example and cover my persimmon grafts with row cover bags to let the new growth establish itself without damage from psyllids. They hit all of my persimmons - kakis and natives - but they don’t seem to have that much of a detrimental effect on older, well established trees.