My pawpaws saplings I planted last fall are still alive!
They have started budding leaves. I know I’m a few years away from fruit production but I am curious if anyone has found good ways to attract pollinators outside of rotting meat. Not sure the city would be very excited about that prospect.
I am considering making a native carion flower plant garden near the trees to make area more attractive to pollinators prior to the pawpaws flowering. Was wondering it anyone else had tried that idea. I’ve found 3 somewhat promising options in my area of Ohio.
These seem to be an especially symbiotic options https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trillium_sessile https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trillium_erectum
And this could be grown if you have a bog garden https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symplocarpus_foetidus
Planting native flowers couldn’t hurt, but as with their Annona relatives, a decent yield of pawpaws will most likely require hand-pollination. People do it, and it works. The flowers are protogynous (effectively female first, then male), so you’ll need to collect pollen from the flowers that are in the male stage and use it to fertilise the flowers still in the female stage, then repeat each day until all flowers have been pollinated. Your devotion shall be rewarded.
EDIT: Thank you for the informative post. Anyone in pawpaw territory would do well to research the plants that you linked.
my brother just recommended pawpaw as to what local trees I should keep while I’m taking out the maples that grow like weeds.
Depends on where you are, how big your yard is.
If the maples are sugar maples I would deeply ask you reconsider ripping them out as they don’t tolerate road polution in urban areas.
I think most are field maples, I’ve been using plantnet to get an idea of what’s growing out of the 100’s of saplings that come up on the hills in my yard. I’ll keep an eye out for sugar maples and keep any if they’re in a good place.
TIL I have to actually do stuff to make sure my pawpaws get pollinated properly. I have several trees and haven’t gotten huge numbers of fruit from them, but it never crossed my mind that that wasn’t just how it was supposed to be.
I only have 2 trees. So I was hoping to boost my yields in a way that doesnt mean hand pollination or hanging a carcass (which I havent seen any hard evidence works, just some anecdotes).
And I thought if I could propose my idea to others and get them to try it, I might have some alternative methods that are less labor intensive options by the time my trees are ready to bear fruit.
I plan on doing the carrion-flower bed as I think its pretty cool but it might be an easier sell to my gf if it is a proven way to boost fertilazation, on the pawpaws.
