There’s alot of people with palsy thats never seen an annona fruit! I have family in Puerto Rico that eat annona daily and their minds are as sharp as a razor! Fear porn seems to be very popular today. There’s always another invisible enemy to fear!
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There are good reasons to follow the science before anecdote, even when the science is based on epidemiological studies where correlation is only evidence, but it is a hell of a lot better than personal epidemiological “studies” that involve only a few people- that is, anecdote.
Your defense of paw-paws may be partially the result of an emotional attachment to the fruit- the science on that, at least, is pretty convincing. We feel and then we look for rationalizations to justify what we feel- we all do it, IMO, even if many of us consider ourselves the pillar of objectivity- including myself on both counts. At least I admit it and I hope that is helpful in coming to more sound deductions.
You also seem open to new information when it arrives, which puts you ahead of the majority of us, I think.
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I agree brother! I do have a very strong attachment to all fruit and feel fruit is much safer to consume than any other foods or food like substances (lab grown).Im not trying to debate the effects of eating annonacin and if I can find stronger scientific evidence showing the true danger and amount
needed to cause that danger I will definitely be willing to change my views!
Do you consume any of the annona fruits?
Have you noticed any effects?
I wonder if any deer,butterfly or other wildlife have gotten palsy from pawpaw? Or are they immune to the effects?
Just trying to learn all I can about them!
Thanks in advance!
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I grow paw paws but am not crazy about them, so I’m not concerned- I don’t eat that many- but they do have a kind of toxic back-taste me and some people are sensitive to it. Paw-paw lovers don’t seem to taste it based on my own anecdotal observation. Who knows, maybe those who can’t could be immune to any consequence.
If I could grow cherimoyas you can be sure I’d eat them with gusto. I certainly did when I lived in S. CA.
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I do not think I’ll ever be able to eat 30 pounds a year of any single fruit. was he living off them? that seems like a lot to me. as a kid a friend and I would split one every few days all summer long. wild pawpaw, that.
this thread is very informative. thanks for all this
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Obviously there is a lot of information that would be nice to have here, that we simply don’t have. E.g. not only do we not know what cultivars he was eating, or if he was consuming any other pawpaw products, we don’t even know how reliable these consumption estimates were.
That said, eating two or three pawpaws per day wouldn’t be difficult if you were turning them into smoothies. That’s like one medium-sized smoothie per day. It would be even easier if you were freezing them so that you could consume them year round. I don’t think any non grower would do this, but if you have tons of fruit that are otherwise going to go bad then it would certainly plausible – if you didn’t have any health concerns about doing so. Especially if you had lots of different cultivars and wanted to try them all each year.
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In the studies they did on mice they injected an equivalent of one fruit a day for a year in their veins daily for thirty days. I have no problem eating 30 to 40 fruits a season. Most cancer’s and neurological issues are probably coming from non organic produce and a long list of other factors.
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That is 2 PawPaws a week., 1 orange a week, 1 banana a week, 1 apple a week, 1 peach a week, 30 meiwa kumquats a week, 1 cabbage a month, I eat 1 orange a day, 1 banana a day, 1 apple a day, every kumquat I pick.
two or so pawpaws a week for a month or two out of the year, that’s about my limit. I tend to give away “extra” fruit and veg. now I can imagine eating twice this much in apples. not a banana person so maybe two a year (lol)
it just seems like a whole lot for a seasonal fruit that I like best in smaller portions.
I do think I may keep reading to see which varieties have less of the chemical, and maybe aim for those as regular harvests.
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A 12 year study done by the U.S. government of 70,000 farmers and their spouses from young to very old, many of whom spent most of the growing seasons of their lives pulling mist blowers from an open tractor, virtually bathing in agricultural chemicals including many now deemed too dangerous for general use, showed they collectively mange to live much longer, get much less cancer, and are overall much more healthy than the average citizens of their states.
If the general public is getting more cancer than they once did, it seems doubtful to me that it is from the relatively miniscule residue left in our food once it gets to market.
Message me if you want to download the study and the follow up. It surprised the hell out of the scientists who conducted it and it surprised me as well. I suspect daily exercise and better diet enjoyed by the average farmer has something to do with it, but there’s always a chance that the generational inheritance of farms favors the physically strong- those that fail have to move on to other businesses.
My opinion is that the organic food movement is an emotionally generated affair and has very little to do with science. Now if you want to talk about the ecological damage caused by massive corporate type farms, performing monoculture, including the agricultural chemicals being used, It think you will be on firmer dirt.
But when humans tripled their population in less that a century and probably quadrupled their industrial consumption (X 12, in other words) you might expect something to give.
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Actually people used to eat organic before the (organic food movement) they just didn’t know it or make a big deal about it.
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On a bit of a tangent, I saw that one of my pawpaw seeds got dug up by a squirrel and dried up. It is pretty neat looking and not sure what is going on there. Also, you can see the leaves started to push out from the core.
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Interesting that you don’t like them more. If you like Cherimoya I would think you should enjoy a high quality pawpaw. What cultivars are you growing or have you tried?
The good one I’m growing is Sunflower.
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Heck, if you’re older than 40 or so, chances are you grew up eating pretty organically.
I know we had a garden growing up and mom used to can a 2-3 weekends a month in the fall.
Scott
I eat them every day when in season. I get why some people don’t care for them too often though. Sometimes pawpaws have off flavors that just don’t agree with you in a subtle way or can be a bit too strong or rich. Shenandoah is not like that for me at all. I can easily eat a large Shenandoah for breakfast every day and not tire of it. It’s just so mellow and pleasant. I find bananas can seem strong tasting compared to them.
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I bought a tiny twig of a tree of Shenandoah from edible landscaping I planted this spring after overwintering in my well house. It is barely growing right now so it may be a while before I can see how much it will change my apatite for paw-paws.
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Shenandoah seems rather precocious, so hopefully it will produce for you sooner rather than later. If you want any scion wood to graft with, I’d be happy to send you some next March.
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About the guy who ate pawpaws and got Parkisons, how do the scientists know that the pawpaws caused the Parkinsons? Would he have had Parkinsons if he had never ate a pawpaw? My father had Parkinsons and he never ate pawpaw.
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Al Horn’s White is supposed to have a cherimoya type flavor per description from Peaceful Heritage. It is also not supposed to be very precocious but if you graft onto your sunflower it should do well.
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