Anyone try the ‘X-42 Gator’ pawpaw yet?
I think i read maybe a fb post a few months ago saying it had thick skin i assume would be either good for bruising and/or animal scrapes during the season.
Not sure if it actually tastes good, or just nice to have for breeding purposes to get thick skin attribute into new varieties.
Cliff looks like just grafted it…
Has anyone already had PAW-PAW of the Petrichor 3 variety bear fruit?
Please show a photo of the fruits, preferably in cross-section. And describe your opinion about the taste, weight of the fruits and the qualities of the tree?
Is it worth it that this variety is too expensive compared to other varieties. But there is almost no information about it except for the online store where it is sold.
I’m interested too. I have a stick on order, despite the price.
From my messaging with him, Petrichor 3 fruited for the first time in 2021. I’m not sure when he first started selling scion wood from it, but from his facebook posts in Pawpaw Fanatics, it sounds like he first sold scion wood in Feb 2024. Probably nobody else has fruited it yet.
It would be nice if he’d open it up to a fruit tasting this summer.
If anyone lives near Asheville NC (think he is near Batcave, NC which is near there), then ask him to pay for a tasting session, and can report back on the tasting results 
Chappell sounds like a real standout. I’m looking forward to it.
I haven’t had it or seen pictures. I do have it grafted at home and based on the flowers I think its a hybrid. Darren at Brambleberry told me that he NEEDED a knife to open the fruit.
@Vitamin I have it grafted but definitely still too young to fruit. It looks like very similar to Susquehanna, and I hope it is an improvement in some way. Higher yield or improved flavor/texture etc. It is possible that it is a self pollinated seedling of Susquehanna. The only reason I think so, is because they have very similar traits in terms of fruit size and seed %.
So these are from Oct 2023, the end of their third growing season(planted spring 2020).
The first picture is unpruned, and the second picture has trees that I grafted in 2022 left and 2023 right. Ill see if I can find some newer pictures. I have also pruned and cut scion from the trees in the background that were all planted at the same time.
The trees I grafted in the second photo were grafted into rootstock planted at the same time, spring 2020, they died back to the roots and sent up a new stem.
hard to see improvements from your pruning here unless ive misinterpreted the context 
I heard from Cliff that Gator was one of the last crosses made by Jerry, I don’t digged further with it’s ancestry but hybrid origin it’s highly possible in my opinion.
I misspoke 2023 would have been its 4th growing season, can you see how much bigger the trees in the background are? Planted the same day.
Tree in the front on the left is the unpruned tree, all the the other trees have been pruned for scion. The smaller one on the right was planted later. Photo is in June of 2023
If the pawpaw tree was multi-grafted, that would provide cross pollination. Self-fertile is when a pawpaw can produce fruit without cross pollination from another genetically different tree (or grafted branch in this example). A few varieties can do this, but yield/quality seem to suffer.
KSU Chappell really is pretty fabulous. I liked it right away, but really got to know it in 2024. It’s extremely productive and the fruit are quite large. Delicious creamy texture, very low seed weight and great tropical flavor. I also really like how super fast the tree grows. It just explodes once it’s established.
As you can see, one setback is it is prone to Phylosticta - note the blotches on the fruit and foliage. However, these photos I took at KSU years ago, and their entire operation is infested with it. I suppose it proves any resistance or lack therof because any seedling they grow or cultivar grown at KSU that is prone to Phylosticta will get slammed with it.
In my organic orchard I have little issue with it thus far, and my fruits were blemish free. Outproduced any other so far.
Anybody that can report on Maria’s Joy taste? Grafting it later.
As a graft on one of my trees years ago, Maria’s Joy does not impress me. It must taste better elsewhere to have gotten the name.
Any opinions?
I have a wild pawpaw planted at 8-9 ft, it has some fruit buds but they are mostly high up (not many branches). Id really like to taste(have another paw paw variety) so that i can determine if i want to full or top graft it. However regardless of outcome i really need to top it because i dont want it more than like 8-10 ft ideally.(and it really needs some branching) do i taste and cut/graft in fall? Or just top it and wait till next year
I tried Maria’s Joy, Tropical Treat, and Potomac last year. I thought they were all very good. Hard to say which was better though.
Maria’s Joy is a bright orange fleshed pawpaw with strong tropical flavor.
I better sample my Maria’s Joy again since I think I’m the source of your MJ scions a few years ago. Glad to hear they taste good on your trees.
I tried it at an orchard in Indiana and didn’t really care for it. Had kind of a coffee aftertaste almost. It could be something to do with just that particular tree or orchard. I’ve noticed that the health and nutrition of the tree can make a big difference in fruit quality.
