Your talking about gibberellic acid (GA3 i think). It supposedly breaks dormancy in seeds, speeding up germiation. Popular with annonas, not sure if it works on pawpaws due to stratification requirements. Theoritically should though.
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Pity gibberellic acid is too hard to make easily. Looked it up and it is manufactured by fermenting grains with Gibberella fujikuroi fungus which is naturally found in the soil. I was half hoping it could be made more easily like most of the industrial acids.
Also evidently saltpetre is used in treating seeds too, by simulating composting manure. Maybe I’ll run a little experiment, half treated in saltpetre water and half not.
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Joined it. What do we do now?
Btw, just starting out with pawpaws. I have 20 or so small trees that i am growing out for grafting. And 100 seeds from wild michigan pawpaws that are in the fridge currently.
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This similar study has images that show leaves that look an awful lot like Spilt Milk.
Scuttlebutt about “variegation” actually being viral has been going around a couple years and even discussed here on the forum.
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I think we should avoid ‘variegated’ pawpaws for this reason. I have once or twice seen them appear in my seedlings in my nursery. They grow extremely slow and deformed. Could be a virus or at best a very bad genetic trait that could hurt vigor and production in future seed generations if allowed to proliferate. Destroy them.
In fact, I destroy any seedlings in my nursery that show extremely low vigor and susceptibility to Phyllosticta
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Anybody got more info on this? Where is Richard when you need him?
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Be careful what you ask for! LOL! Ahh, but Mr. Frost is indeed a store house of knowledge. Hopefully he will comment.
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I just planted two pawpaw whips (about 5-6’ tall, no branches) in the fall. I believe they are Prolific and Mango grafts. Is there anything I should be doing to encourage them to grow strong and healthy? I have heard NOT to prune pawpaws. Also, about how many years does it take them to fruit? Thanks in advance!!
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If I were in your shoes, I’d read one of the good recent books on pawpaws by Blake Cothron or Michael Judd. To start things off I’d ask how far apart you planted the two? If you have room (you can space them as close as 8 ft apart, max 12 ft) I’d plan to plant at least 1 or 2 more- say Shenandoah and Chappelle to help pollination, that can be iffy with pawpaws. Not too soon for a couple inches of compost in a wide circle, (I do 8 foot diam circle), topped with 6 to 8 inches of free tree co. woodchips. They ADORE organic matter, compost, mulch. I do 3 ft tall fencing around each 8 ft diam mulch ring to prevent buck-rub. I put hardware cloth cage say 1 ft diameter x 15 inches tall around base of each trunk to keep compost and mulch off trunk- imp. If excellent culture maybe 3 to 4 years to fruit but could easily go longer. Full sun? Near garden hose?
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Steve has nailed it. Pruning pawpaws is fine. It should just be for good purpose and done for things like: sucker removal, removing growth below the graft union, removing limbs that will form bad crotch angles eventually ( shaped like a Y or U ), removing broken limbs, and to remove the central leader (in a number of years from now). This keeps the tree shorter and easier to harvest from.
In the spring after ALL chance of frost, apply fish emulsion, or equivalent organic fertilizer. I use granulated chicken manure and a water soluble soy fertilizer to great effect. I do this in May and again in June, and a final liquid feed in early July. People underestimate pawpaws needs for heavy fertilization, and then wonder why the trees take 10 years to start fruiting.
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Progress report. No movement after 2 weeks (but based on WT’s method, should expect a month, maybe a bit longer since I suspect my cheap Amazon heat mat is not putting out pellet stove heat). Will check again in 2 more.
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How long did you cold stratify them? I assume it’s been 3mos since we went to Ockoo in early October. I don’t bring mine out of the fridge until March. I don’t have a good greenhouse/grow light setup so I don’t want the seedlings getting leggy.