North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Lucky Pittman <lucky.pittman@murraystate.edu>]

Gordon mentioned my "Trash Pile" A.parviflora(dwarf pawpaw) selection in 
his listing of pawpaw varieties he's got growing.
Thought I'd give some details on this one:

I selected this one from plants growing on my parents' farm, in 
east-central AL - it's growing on top of a red clay hill, at the edge of an 
old trash pile, where bricks, discarded lumber, etc. had been piled in a 
gully through the years - at one time it was in the open, but kudzu and 
sweetgum trees are rapidly encroaching on it, since they sold off all the 
beef cows.   I don't know how old the plant is, it's about  8 ft 
tall.  There are no other pawpaws within 100 yards of this one, but it 
bears heavily every year, making me suspect that it may be 
self-fertile.  Branches are festooned with little fruits all along their 
length, not in 'hands' like A.triloba; fruit is nothing to write home 
about, 2-inch fruits - mostly seed, with a small rim of pulp surrounding 
them.
A.parviflora is pretty common on upland sites in that area, with A.triloba 
more prevalent along the creekbanks and river bottom forests.

I brought scions of "Trash Pile" back to KY 2-3 years ago, and have a 
graftling of this one growing in the orchard, grafted on seedling A.triloba 
understock.   I don't have any hopes of it being anything great from a 
production standpoint - I propagated it mainly out of curiosity, and for 
nostalgia's sake.  It bloomed and set a few fruit this year - but I haven't 
looked at them since Robert stopped by here on his way to the SFF meeting, 
back in late July.
Sent Gordon scions a couple of years ago, and if I recall correctly, it 
seems to be doing just fine in Michigan; seems like I recall Gordon telling 
me he had a late freeze last year that burned the leaves off his 
A.trilobas, but the A.parviflora was unscathed.

Lucky Pittman
USDA Zone 6
Hopkinsville, KY