I’ve visited Prague only for a couple of days in 2016. Love it. Wish we had more time to sight-see outside the city.
I wonder with different soil and climate, would the same varieties grown in the US and your country produce different quality of fruit.
I personally do not like Shanxi Li. The pro is fruit are large, the con is the taste, dry and spngy. It will take Sugar Cane and Honey Jar anyday.
I live close to Prague (just 40 km 
)
Here in czech we have pretty cold in a winter (-4°f or even less (on per 10 year aproximately) and every year there can be something like 5°f at least one day during night)
And during summer its from 70 to 95.
During last years even spring and autumn are pretty hot.
So we have pretty huge difference between summer and winter weather so i need to pick varieties which survive winter.
Btw. I went through discussion… And thanks fir mentioning shaanxli because i read exactly same opinion from someone in czech dry and taste is much worse than li.
Btw. Does anyone have ga-866 or red land? I tried to find something but i only find ine article where is written that it have high suger cintent and thats all.
I will pick li and gigante (same nursery) and i wonder if i should pick honey jar (very very positive feedback from people who have it in czech) or redland (for both i would need to wait till next year)
Now i can pick sugar cane or ga-866 (but i have no idea if they are good or not. Didnt find anything)
Btw sorry that i jumped to jujube from pawpaw
The only think I have heard about GA866 is it’s non productive.
I don’t have it. I have a Sugar Cane and I like it a lot.
hello everyone:-)
So at the end I just picked what was available … as usual I simply dont want to wait and who knows what will be available in one month.
I am very curious if my pick was good or bad… time will tell.
My pick is Prima, Belle, Allegheny, PA golden 3 - I tried to pick the ones which should be productive based on reports. (I seen there convis for example and 6 year tree looks really nice. I was pretty surprised )
I also picked persimmons Nikita gift, Geneva Red, NB-NO2 (Zima khurma), Nikita bordo, 2x nikita bordovaja x taishu (I originally want to pick sosnovska, chuchupaka etc. but I didnt want to travel 200 km there when I have nursery with already tested persimmons just few kilometers away. (everything is grafted on lotus (based on report if its grafted on virginiana it drops fruit like crazy)
I need to pick Jujube later, because its sold out everywhere right now
Pawpaw is my wife’s absolute favorite fruit, but my oldest daughter who will eat any other kind of fruit, even very low quality (sour, seedy, etc.) fruits, doesn’t like to eat it at all, not even good named varieties.
The taste of jujubes from the same tree has been quite variable for me from year to year and from the beginning of the season til the end, but based on the average fruit I’ve gotten, of the varieties I’ve gotten samples of fruit from so far, for fresh eating appeal I’d rank Li tops, then Lang, Coco, Honey Jar, Shanxi Li, and Sugarcane all very close together, and finally Sherwood at the bottom (although a small percentage of my Sherwoods are sometimes pretty good.) I have Redlands, too, but I haven’t gotten a good sample from it yet.
thanks to @tonyOmahaz5 for sharing some notes on pawpaw for my next planting.Think I’m settling going with Shenandoah.
But putting this out there as future reference for others and myself.
Ohio PawPaw festival Best PawPaw Contest (I would love to know the missing results for 2016 and 2015.
2018
First Place, Variety: Bennie’s Favorite (Homebreed), AJ Lehman
Second Place: Open pollinated Atwood, Mark Lehman
Third Place: Green Gem, Justin Woodruff
2017
First Place: Jerry’s Big Girl, Jerry Lehman, Terre Haute, IN
Second Place: Shenandoah, George Hale, Columbus, OH
Third Place: Berkeley, Joe Kostka, Natrona Heights, PA
2014
1st place: Deanna Powell, Variety: Lynn’s Favorite
2nd place: Barb Lehman , Variety: 275-48
3rd place: Mark Lehman , Variety: 250-30
2013
1st place: Jerry Lehman, variety 250-39
2nd place: Barbara Lehman, variety 250-48
3rd place: Maddy Singh, variety IXL
2012
1st: Jerry Lehman, variety: #cu 166-13|
2nd: Dick Glaser, variety: Overleese|
3rd: Dick Glaser, variety: Shenandoah|
2011
1st: Deanna Powell for Overleese
2nd: Charles Colgate for NCI Harvest Gold Butter Sweet
3rd: Dick Glaser for Shawnee Trail
2010
1st: Sunflower, Charles Colgate
2nd: Scooby, Andy Campbell
3rd: Marina, Kelly Bock
Brix References:
Hi 4-1 is KSU Chappelle and Hi 7-5 is KSU Benson according to an FB post. Not sure what hi1-4 or 7-1 are. Article
Only nonKSU reference point: Sunflower - (8.58 seed percentage (highest)
KSU Chappelle - Brix 25.64 (highest), 4.39 Seed percentage,
KSU Bensen - Brix 19.67 (lowest)
separate article with atwood
Jay Little’s Excel Spreadsheet on Paw Paw varieties.
FB post on PawPaw fanclub on tasting notes by Tony Levri. Preserving for future reference
As someone who greatly appreciates detailed flavor profiles of different varieties of fruits, I’ll leave my opinions here of the named varieties I’ve tried.
I went to a pawpaw festival in York, PA last year and got to try some named varieties for the first time. Had some named varieties at the Ohio festival a few years ago but they weren’t labeled so I didn’t know what they were. I’ve also tasted a lot of local wild pawpaws over the past 3 years.
I typically taste 3 main flavors in a pawpaw: banana, melon/cantaloupe, and a tropical fruity flavor that reminds me of tutti-frutti or bubblegum. (I’ll just call this flavor: fruity) Some seem to call that flavor mango but I never really taste mango. Most wild pawpaws I’ve tasted in western PA are a combination of banana and cantaloupe flavors with a small amount of fruity flavor.
I took notes on the varieties I tried from the York festival and here is what I wrote:
Shenandoah - creamy texture, mildly flavored though still very good, not too much banana flavor, banana & fruity flavors are subtle, no melon flavor, has a vanilla flavor to it that makes it taste a lot like vanilla pudding
NC-1 - banana/cantaloupe, flavorful, tastes like most wild pawpaws though a good version of those, not much fruity flavor, a lot of banana flavor, fairly strongly flavored overall
Susquehanna - very sweet, firmer, smooth texture with light orange color, a lot of fruity flavor, a bit of cantaloupe flavor, hardly any banana flavor
PA-Golden - tastes similar to most wild pawpaws (banana/melon), has noticeable bitterness to pulp, especially near the seeds, not as good as the better wild ones I’ve tasted
Allegheny - difficult to pin down in terms of flavor. Came to the conclusion that it has a very well balanced mix of all 3 flavors (cantaloupe/banana/fruity). Hard to taste any 1 flavor distinctly. Some bites did have a stronger cantaloupe flavor to them
Looking back at this, my conclusions are that:
Shenandoah is more uniquely flavored than most, more mild than most, easy to eat, and generally pleasing.
NC-1 is a typically flavored pawpaw that is good for those who like the ones that are more strongly banana flavored.
Susquehanna is a good for those who like a sweeter, richer, and more tropical flavored pawpaw.
PA-Golden isn’t one that I would recommend for flavor due to it’s bitterness and NC-1 tasting like a better version of it’s flavor profile.
Allegheny has a well-balanced flavor profile. I wish more wild ones tasted like this, since the banana flavors tend to dominate, but with Allegheny the melon and fruity flavors shine through better.
I didn’t pay particular attention to textures with these fruits, mostly noting that Shenandoah was softer and creamy, Susquehanna was firmer, and the others were somewhere in between. I know that the Mango variety is known to have a softer, pudding-like texture. One of my favorite wild trees has fruits on the extreme softer end that have a texture like wet pudding or (for a better descriptor) a very soft, juicy, non-fibrous mango.
Are you going to hand pollinate them to ensure fruits set?
I actually wrote most of that post on this thread first (scroll up to post 182) and just copied and pasted onto the pawpaw fanclub page when someone wanted opinions on some varieties. I’m glad people appreciate my opinions.
I would have named myself Tony_westPA on here but there were already a few notable Tony’s on this forum already so I’d rather not cause confusion.
I will try hopefully they’re bearing fruits this year.I just relocated them before Winter.
How many Pawpaw trees you have and how big Tony ?
At what point is the paw paw pollen not viable, when it turns that darker color?
I got a total of eight paw paw trees but the 4 multi grafted are oldest at 8 years of age. I yearly pruned them to 8 feet tall and 6 feet wide in early Spring.
Tony
Jim,
Check out this thread. Post # 42 is when a member @misoo83 posted his video about stages of pawpaw flowers.
Pollinating Pawpaw flowers - #43 by Paperboy4828.
Also the pic of a fish head stuck on a pawpaw tree to attract flies was quite hilarious. We’ll do anything for cross pollination!!!
I collected and froze pollen from an NC-1 and Sunflower.The trees died a couple years ago.
This year,an Overleese is getting hand pollinated with that seed.Maybe it will work.bb
Good luck, hope it works.
I hand pollinated my Penn Golden pawpaw about one week ago but it didn’t look like any baby paw paws started growing. I went back to my neighbors house and got more pollen and tried again last night and I think I’ll try again this weekend. I did the same thing I did last year with the hand pollination and got 6 paw paws last year. Hopefully some take this year.
I grafted three different types onto the tree earlier in the spring and have a seedling growing next to it. The grafts seemed like they all took so that’s promising.
My pawpaw planting about 5 ft from the house. Do you think her root be OK for the house foundation Tony?
The taste of different varieties of pawpaw is big difference or all most the same ? How do you think about NC1 and Sunflower tasting?
Ah roger. I tried searching bit I didn’t see the that pop up in my initial search.
It’s good to connect the dots with who wrote it though. 
If someone was to ask you now that time has passed, would you still hold those same opinions? Any change?
I still feel mostly the same about those opinions.
I think I appreciate the flavor profile of Allegheny more, the more that I think about it. It is a great example of what I think a good general pawpaw flavor should taste like and what I would want to give to someone should they ask what a pawpaw tastes like. Shenandoah is great for introducing pawpaw to people since it is more mild and familiar tasting but doesn’t actually taste that much like a pawpaw. It is great though and I value it for it’s uniqueness and ease of eating.
Susquehanna is still probably my favorite that I tasted since I like the strong, tropical, fruity flavors that it has… but maybe Allegheny is tied the more I think about it haha. NC-1 was also a very good pawpaw, I just didn’t prefer it to the previous ones because I don’t prefer pawpaws with stronger banana-like flavors.
Maybe I was too harsh on PA-Golden but, eh… it was like a mildly bitter/worse version of NC-1. It was still good, but didn’t impress me compared to the others or even some wild pawpaws I’ve tried. I’d kill for a fresh PA-Golden at this time of year though, haha.
