I think that late frosts are a concern for every kind of fruit grower. With climate instability, this is definitely a problem we should be thinking of. I’m all for the growingfruit pawpaw people to be leading the charge in science (see above! I think we should be doing the pawpaw science!) So I do think @Blake is right and we should all be looking for frost resistant cultivars.
From my (limited) peach experience and extensive reading of @Olpea’s extensive peach experience, there’s more to producing after frost than just late blooming. It seems like some cultivars just bloom longer. Or their blooms are less sensitive somehow. I have one tree that seems to produce when all the others are frost damaged- and it blooms second of all my peach trees. So it’s blooming early, but still gives fruit?
I think the endpoint should always be: How much fruit (good fruit) was produced in the end? Sometimes late bloom = fruit. But not always - I worry something will get missed if we look at the bloom as the endpoint.
If you can somehow put string lights on them or mist or something… but you have to keep the ground warmth in or add a heater element.
Fortunately, if it’s only 25F for a short time you’ll probably be ok. I have hit 25F multiple times and gotten fruit. If you have an extended time or it dips very low or if you’ve never had temps like that… maybe trouble
well…..blooms on March 16…..that’s tough….very tough………I don’t expect bloom here until the first week in May……good luck…..Beemster…….Z6A… Dutchess County NY
Thanks for the feedback! I’m in northern Utah. I plan on having them on drip and can adjust the schedule to whatever they need. I’ve heard that tree tubes can also help with the leaves drying out. I haven’t bought any yet so I can get taller ones to give the pawpaws time to acclimate. I plan to leave them on for at least 2 years. I do have the option of planting several in the shade of a barn, on the east side. Maybe that will help them bear the sun a bit better?
Here’s some pictures from a friend in my valley that has a few growing. All of his are planted on the east side of a house except the first, which is the west side.
I advise fertilizer application after all chance of frost and freeze. You don’t want to stimulate a flush of growth before all chance of freezing temps are well over. So I usually wait until sometime in May in our area.
I’d plant them east of a building if you can. That one on the west side looks really rough. Could be from southwest injury or too much scorching afternoon sun drying it out or like @Blake said , could also be BSD (I like the name “vascular wilt” better. It definitely evokes a picture like the first one above).
I see your friend also painted the trunks white which probably is helpful. And that they are having some success with all those fruits! Also, I’m impressed they don’t have terrible iron chlorosis, those leaves are not as dark as expected, but they’re pretty good for alkaline soils. What is your friend doing for watering? or is he just in a lucky place?
My alkalinity is similar to that in Utah. The problem isn’t even the soil - it’s the irrigation water, which is going to be alkaline as well. For iron you can mix iron and sulfur in a hole near the plantings. You can spray borax. Professional growers acidify their irrigation water and do fertigation…
Dare I even ask why pawpaw and not peaches or something?
Does anyone know how to safely repot a pawpaw? I am located in the UK and received this pawpaw from a nursery. According to the nursery it’s been in this pot since last spring.
It’s around 2ft tall (60cm) and the base the trunk is just over 1/2 an inch (0.6cm) in diameter. It’s in a 1/2 gallon (2L) pot which is 4.5 inches tall (11.5cm) and has a diameter of 6.5 inches (16.5cm). There is exposed roots on the surface so i think it’s heavily rootbound.
From what i understand pawpaw’s are sensitive to root disturbance. If i see circling when i try to repot it what is the best course of action? Should i just try and untangle the roots or is it better to leave it as is. I know i should put them in the ground but i have no permanent location for them at moment.
Try to find a large fabric pot, but make sure its elevated several inches off the ground. Pawpaws should be cared for but I think people tend to treat them like they’re made of glass. They’re pretty tough plants, but life as a small grafted tree in a pot is not how they evolved to grow. Itll be OK if its in a pot for an extra year, it won’t be ideal but itll probably still live if it has enough nutrients and water.
Thank you. I think they used air pruning beds or something, since I didn’t see any tap root or anything. The root ball didn’t look too bad to be honest. I think I did it at the perfect time.
Luckily a lot of flowers made it. I think the large flower buds died as well as the fully red flowers but the green flowers and small buds pulled through.
Hopefully we avoid any other cold weather in these unpredictable springs we have in TN.
I’m curious if anyone has any experience with multi-cultivar grafted pawpaws, like some people have multi-cultivar grafted pears or apples. I’m extremely space constrained, and trying to figure out my options.
Yes, I have a Mango pawpaw that I’ve been grafting different cultivars to its branches over the past few years. I have 22 varieties on it thus far, not including Mango itself. Multi-grafting pawpaws seems to work very well when grafted onto a vigorous variety or rootstock.
22 varieties on one tree sounds awesome! How many pawpaws of each variety do you get approximately each year? How big is the tree? I have a few pawpaws planted And plan to multigraft- do you have any lessons learned to share?
holy crap, that was far beyond whatever i expected you to say. i only have one pawpaw large enough for multi-grafting, but good to know i can maybe stick 1-2 on it, and focus on some quality rootstock for future. i impulse bought like 10 different cultivars by scion this year before realizing i don’t have nearly enough tree or rootstock to graft it to, yet.
Well I only started getting fruit from a few of the grafts last year. The tree is over 10 ft tall, but I prune it back every year to keep it from getting any taller than that. Mango is a strong grower that puts out a lot of sturdy branches, which makes it ideal for a project like that. Also despite being so vigorous, Mango doesn’t produce that well for me and I don’t care for the fruits that much, so I had lots of good reasons to graft it over lol.
As far as what I’ve learned: At first I grafted onto outer branches to match the size of the scion to the branch. I didn’t know how well a multigrafted pawpaw would work out, so this seemed like a safe way to do it. It worked out fine, but took some time for those branches to size up and start producing flowers. Last year I was more aggressive in cutting lower and grafting on some larger diameter branches with bark grafts or thick scions. It’s a bit riskier, but if you’re confidant with your grafts and vigor of your tree then I think that’s the way to go. That Mango tree has so many branches, that I can afford to be pretty aggressive with my grafts.
Also, if there are branches that are growing lower than the graft, I can prune those out to put more energy into the graft. I even cut a couple grafts off the other day, so that my graft of Al Horn can have more energy going into it (they were all connected to the same branch).
Also, if you know that a cultivar is high vigor or low vigor, then be careful about where you put them. A high vigor cultivar can be put on an outer branch and do well, whereas a low vigor cultivar might not do much in that situation. Best to put low vigor cultivars on a larger branch or with a low cut bark graft.
