I got interested in smaller papaya plants because the L-A-R-G-E samples I've had were a pain to pick fruit from as they grew very tall. When it came time to take them down they were a seriously big mess. The one redeeming aspect is the fruits were very good without any hint of the typical rancid smell, or vomit overtones in the flavor.
So, I noted a few small stature samples from a batch of seedlings I planted, and picking the smallest tree from every generation yielded truly dwarf (by humongous size comparison to the original parent) trees. These fruited three to four feet from the ground, and stayed petite (no more than 7-8 feet) while keeping a base caliper less than six inches in diameter. I'm on my third and possibly last generation of attempts to get reasonably edible fruit.
Each successive generation yielded fewer, smaller fruits with fewer seeds, and on this third generation, the fruit are insipid AND none of the very few seeds that were in the fruit have germinated so far. Surprisingly the squirrels seem to like them more than other fruits I'd prefer they not eat :-)
This is so disappointing as I had high hopes for these samples. Has anyone else done anything like this?