Pawpaw in containers?

[BloomAndSprout]

I have a pawpaw tree from OneGreenWorld I'm debating whether to plant or put in a container to live entirely outdoors (why bring a pawpaw in? they're cold hardy!).  I have shitty clay rocky soil, but on a slope so it drains well. My plant real estate space is low and while I'll have access to these trees for the foreseeable future, I plan to move in the next few years and it would be nice to take a developed pawpaw with me. I already have three in the ground here in various locations so pollination is not an issue.

Of course my future option which I had already been planning was just to graft new trees, or raise seedlings to use as rootstock in the future.

Obviously they need deep containers for their tap root, but how well will it do?  Especially for 2-5 years?

Any thoughts?

[Tropicaltoba]

I tried this a couple of years back, when my ambitions were greater than my experience, with no success. I had these 32” tall pots that I grew them in, did ok during the summer but leaves often got fried by the sun if they weren’t shaded. For the winter I moved the pots around trying to get enough chill hours while not letting them get too cold. They never leafed out the spring, still green under the bark for the whole summer so still alive, they just never leafed out.

The tricky issue with the pots is they need to be super deep for the taproot, but by having them in a pot the roots will be way colder than they would be in the ground 3 feet down. Here in zone 3 the frost line is 4-8 feet deep depending on snow cover and winter temps. In zone 6 I bet the ground around the roots barely gets below freezing. If you have access to a bunch of seeds I’d try it but you may be wasting money on grafted trees.

[BloomAndSprout]

I tried this a couple of years back, when my ambitions were greater than my experience, with no success. I had these 32” tall pots that I grew them in, did ok during the summer but leaves often got fried by the sun if they weren’t shaded. For the winter I moved the pots around trying to get enough chill hours while not letting them get too cold. They never leafed out the spring, still green under the bark for the whole summer so still alive, they just never leafed out.

The tricky issue with the pots is they need to be super deep for the taproot, but by having them in a pot the roots will be way colder than they would be in the ground 3 feet down. Here in zone 3 the frost line is 4-8 feet deep depending on snow cover and winter temps. In zone 6 I bet the ground around the roots barely gets below freezing. If you have access to a bunch of seeds I’d try it but you may be wasting money on grafted trees.

Here we had snow and temps down to 8-12F (on a small lake, not sure how that effects the microclimate) and my 2 potted feijoa seedlings survived with some defoliation. I think pawpaw should handle the cold fine in my area, even in a pot; what I'm more concerned about is their taproot. Once you get big enough your options on pots becomes more limited. Of course I could plant out if more mature if I really need to

[Triloba Tracker]

Not sure they actually need the space for a taproot.

[Tropicaltoba]

Tell me more? How old? Soil mix? Plans?

[Triloba Tracker]

Those were three months old.
I sowed one seed per pot in mid November and they emerged by mid December.
This was aided by the fact they were in a heated grow tent under full spectrum LED light for 16 hours a day (not that pawpaws need light to germinate- just explaining the setup).

The key to this experiment was Microkote, a root pruning paint I applied to the inside of the pots.
It terminates all roots upon contact.
Similar root pruning can be done via air pruning pots or bags.

There are others who’ve demonstrated positive (if not enhanced) results with limiting pawpaw taproot growth. One is Jim Dingus at Pawpaw Chronicles on YouTube.

Oh and the soil is Promix Bx-M