The Tropical Fruit Forum

Temperate Fruit & Orchards => Temperate Fruit Discussion => Topic started by: TriangleJohn on March 27, 2015, 10:05:32 AM

Title: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: TriangleJohn on March 27, 2015, 10:05:32 AM
Before a hard freeze this weekend I thought I would run out and snap a few photos of the pawpaws in bloom. These are seedling trees collected from fruit grown by a researcher. The parents were all named cultivars but the seedlings are all crosses. Last year was the first time I got fruit off of any of them. Some were large, some were small, all were tasty. Looks like a heavy bloom this year but I don't know how the 26 degrees this weekend will affect them.


(http://s18.postimg.cc/ymuyvawad/DSCN0639.jpg) (http://postimg.cc/image/ymuyvawad/)

(http://s14.postimg.cc/xemhapdql/DSCN0640.jpg) (http://postimg.cc/image/xemhapdql/)

(http://s21.postimg.cc/b11qgrlb7/DSCN0638.jpg) (http://postimg.cc/image/b11qgrlb7/)
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: FlyingFoxFruits on March 27, 2015, 08:35:29 PM
nice pics!  hope u get lots of fruits...u gonna try your hand at hand pollinating?
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: TriangleJohn on March 28, 2015, 10:25:36 AM
I got plenty of fruit last year without hand pollinating so I won't be doing it this year. There seems to be a lot of pollinating flies and bees around when it warms up during the day (my yard is weedy). I don't know how the cold temps will affect the blossoms, they are now saying it will get into the low 20's tonight. All I can do is wait and see.
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: Bob407 on March 28, 2015, 10:59:53 PM
I think the flowers will be just fine, I could be wrong. While roaming around Tennessee in December I found a few trees pushing flowers and the temp was bouncing around from high 20s to high 30s.



Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: FlyingFoxFruits on March 29, 2015, 12:31:53 AM
I got plenty of fruit last year without hand pollinating so I won't be doing it this year. There seems to be a lot of pollinating flies and bees around when it warms up during the day (my yard is weedy). I don't know how the cold temps will affect the blossoms, they are now saying it will get into the low 20's tonight. All I can do is wait and see.

ok good to hear u get lots of fruits without having to worry about pollination!
good luck with the cold! I will pray for you and your poor man's bananas!
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: Bob407 on March 30, 2015, 10:52:32 PM
So how did they hold up?
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: TriangleJohn on April 01, 2015, 02:20:44 PM
The yard took a big hit - lots of flowers got frozen and some newly sprouted leaves got damaged beyond repair. The pawpaws seem to have only lost about a quarter of their flowers so they should be fine since they were blooming so heavily. I really won't know for another month when the fruit starts to develop. Kiwis were damaged severely but should snap out of it but I doubt they will make new flower buds. Plums, Peaches and Apricots seem to have lost most of their flowers but not all of them. Pears appeared fine but upon closer inspection the flowers were damaged. I'm not sure what this means future fruit-wise. Some of these trees were just getting to fruiting size, this would have been their first fruiting summer. One of my hardy citrus hybrids bit the dust. Because it had been so warm for the weeks leading up to this past weekend a lot of plants were starting to bloom or push out leaves. Most of the fruiting plants in the garden can take cold weather so the plants will survive but this years crop will be low or gone completely. Now that it has warmed up, it's time to start fighting Fire Blight and Cedar Quince Rust.
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: TriangleJohn on April 17, 2015, 04:13:57 PM
Well most of the flowers made it and most of them were fertilized. These trees like to grow fruit in clusters, sometimes as many as 6 pawpaws per stem which keeps the fruit small. Does anyone know of the technique for fruit pruning? At what point do I start snipping? Some of them fall off before they get too big but I would like to encourage large fruit. The few flowers that developed single fruits gave me nice large fruit.


(http://s11.postimg.cc/7fjt3i3cf/DSCN0704.jpg) (http://postimg.cc/image/7fjt3i3cf/)


(http://s28.postimg.cc/4tkil997t/DSCN0706.jpg) (http://postimg.cc/image/4tkil997t/)


(http://s21.postimg.cc/y71msdaub/DSCN0703.jpg) (http://postimg.cc/image/y71msdaub/)
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: Triloba Tracker on April 17, 2015, 10:54:10 PM
Well most of the flowers made it and most of them were fertilized. These trees like to grow fruit in clusters, sometimes as many as 6 pawpaws per stem which keeps the fruit small. Does anyone know of the technique for fruit pruning? At what point do I start snipping? Some of them fall off before they get too big but I would like to encourage large fruit. The few flowers that developed single fruits gave me nice large fruit.


Interesting that you asked about thinning because I was asking about it in the Wild Pawpaw thread. I was considering thinning some of the wild trees I've pollinated.
So I did a little googling. Here's some info from a paper published by kentucky state university:
"Trees were thinned on June 8, 2006 and June 6, 2008, prior to June drop, and when a majority of the fruit on the trees were approximately
1.5 cm in length. . . Fruit in a cluster were gently pinched or broken off . . . " by hand.
I think you just reach up there and pinch 'em off. Folks suggest, of course, pinching the smallest fruits.

Another document from Ohio Pawpaw Growers suggests thinning "early, for the benefit of the crop."

The trees will naturally drop excess fruit in May and/or June. KYSU studied thinning clusters to only 1 fruit, and reported apparently great success in doing so. Seems a little extreme but, I dunno.

This motivates me to do some thinning in the wild trees i've found, for sure.
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: plantrant on April 18, 2015, 08:11:50 AM
I just thinned out lots of baby fruit this week while the fruit that were set are between 1/8" thick and 3/8" thick, and most were in pairs or clusters. I left the bigger fruit. I removed many clusters that were on the same small branch so that only one remained on each branch. I removed all fruit that were high up in the trees. That way, when they were full sized, I could more easily enclose the fruit inside plastic grocery bags that were tied above the branches. When the fruit ripen fully they just fall down inside the bag instead of all the way to the ground where they can get damaged, especially by hungry crawling bugs. Last year I waited too long before thinning and ended up removing lots of fruit that were 2" - 3" long. Since the trees tend to over-produce, I wanted more leaves to be able to nourish a smaller amount of fruit.
Title: Re: Pawpaws starting to flower
Post by: Bob407 on April 18, 2015, 09:24:52 AM
Planrant, tying the bags to catch the fruit is a great idea! It is such a small window of opportunity when they are ripe.