Pawpaw

Asimina triloba

Family Annonaceae

TreeNativeZones 5-8

Botanical illustration of Pawpaw

North America's largest native fruit — and almost nobody has tasted it. Pawpaw ripens to a soft custard with the flavor of banana, mango and vanilla, too delicate to ship, which is exactly why it never reaches a grocery shelf and why it's worth a corner of your yard.

The tree itself is easy company: a small, tidy understory native that fruits in dappled shade, shrugs off deer, and hosts the zebra swallowtail. Plant two for pollination and September does the rest.

Where to buy pawpaw — 9 nurseries compared

  • Shade when young
  • High water
  • Moderate growth
  • Native to North America
  • Excellent edible
  • Attracts butterflies
  • 400-1000 winter chill
  • Needs a pollination partner
Pawpaw — a print from the Plant Library collection

From the print shop

Growing pawpaw? Hang it.

Our Plant Library collection carries pawpaw — Asimina triloba, print Nº 351, “Pawpaw.”

526 designsfrom $12.99white or black backgroundmatte poster, unframed

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Will it fruit where you are?

Enter your ZIP — we look up your USDA hardiness zone (2023 map) and check it against what pawpaw actually needs.

Hardy inZones 5-8
Winter chill400-1000
PollinationPartner needed

Pawpaw · Common problems

Common pawpaw problems

Pests, diseases and weather to keep an eye on.

Pests

2 problems on file

  • Pawpaw Peduncle Borer
  • Zebra Swallowtail Caterpillar (Host plant)

Diseases

2 problems on file

Pollination

Poor pollination → low fruit set (plant a partner)

Pawpaw · Growing & propagation

Growing pawpaw

Light, water, soil, propagation and the season’s jobs.
What it needsThe details
Light
Shade when young (<2 years), Full Sun for fruit
Water
High, likes moist soil
Soil
Rich, Humus-heavy, Moist, Acidic to Neutral · pH 5.5 - 7.0
Fertilizer
High Nitrogen / Organic Matter
Pruning
Late Winter

Minimal. Remove suckers (unless creating a patch).

Spacing
8-15 ft

How to plant & propagate pawpaw

Propagate
Grow seedlings from seed kept moist and cold-stratified before sowing

Seedlings are genetically variable and do not reproduce a named cultivar exactly. Named cultivars are normally grafted onto pawpaw seedling rootstock. Cuttings and layering are not recommended as routine home propagation methods.

Propagation source: Alabama Cooperative Extension: Pawpaw Production Guide.

Pawpaw · Harvest & keeping

What you get from pawpaw

How long before it bears, how much it gives, how you know it is ready, and how long it keeps once picked.
Botanical illustration of Pawpaw
Years to first harvest
3 to 8 years
Typical yield
20–50 lbs
What you eat
Fruit
How to tell it is ready
Softens like an avocado turns aromatic and drops
How long it keeps
2-3 days fresh

Freeze the pulp

Pawpaw · Seasonal care & spray guidance

The pawpaw growing playbook

Field-tested instructions for every job pawpaw asks of you, compiled from university extension guidance — in the order the season brings them.

While it is dormant

winter, before growth starts

1 job
PruningIn winter

Dormant prune to a central leader

While the tree is dormant and still leafless, keep one central trunk with well spaced scaffold branches and remove crossing or rubbing limbs. Spread narrow crotches to widen the angles. Pull root suckers off at the base to hold a single trunk. If a transplant lost a lot of root, cut the top back to match what the roots can still supply. Work in the leafless window before buds begin to swell, which falls later in the north than in the south. Pawpaw wood is weak and its leaves are large and heavy, so narrow crotch angles split under a fruit load. Pruning while dormant also lets you see the framework, and the cuts are made when the tree is not pushing sap.

As growth begins

early spring

2 jobs
FeedingIn spring

Feed in spring, and stop by midsummer

Once the tree is established, broadcast a balanced granular fertilizer such as 10-10-10 once in spring, from the trunk out to the outermost branches. Do not fertilize after midsummer. Keep soil pH between 5.5 and 6.5, and soil test before adding calcium once the tree starts fruiting. Nitrogen applied late in the season pushes soft new growth that has not hardened off by the first freeze, and pawpaw is fussy about pH: outside roughly 5.5 to 6.5 it cannot take up iron and other micronutrients even when they are present in the soil.

ProtectionIn spring

Shade the tree through its first summer

For any seedling or grafted tree under about 24 inches tall, suspend 33 percent shade cloth above it for the whole establishment year. Remove the shade the following spring once the tree is rooted in and taller. Pawpaw evolved as a forest understory tree, and its seedlings lack the light-shock protection of a sun species: full sun in year one scorches the leaves and stalls or kills a transplant that would otherwise thrive.

While it flowers

at bloom

1 job
What to watch forAt bloom

Hand pollinate between two different trees at bloom

Check the maroon flowers daily through bloom. Take pollen from a flower whose anthers are brown, loose, and shedding yellow dust, and dab it with a small artist's brush onto the stigma of a flower on a genetically different tree while the stigma tips are still green, glossy, and sticky. Two grafted trees of the same cultivar will not work, they are the same plant. Pawpaw flowers are self-incompatible and protogynous, so the stigma is receptive before that same flower's own pollen is ripe. Their natural pollinators are flies and beetles rather than bees, and they visit erratically, which is why a healthy tree covered in bloom so often sets nothing.

Through summer

the growing season

2 jobs
WateringIn summer

Keep water steady for the first two years

Water deeply whenever the top few inches of soil dry out, from planting through the second growing season. Pawpaw wants the equivalent of at least 32 inches of rain a year spread evenly, so make up the gap in any dry stretch rather than waiting for the tree to wilt. Pawpaw comes from moist bottomland soils and transplants carry a fleshy, brittle root system that regenerates slowly, so a young tree cannot mine dry soil for water the way a drought-adapted fruit tree can.

What to watch forThrough summer

Pull webworm nests by hand through summer

Walk the tree through summer looking for Asimina webworm nests, which tie leaves together into a shelter at the shoot tips, and for peduncle borer damage. Prune out and destroy the nests by hand and keep fallen leaves and fruit cleaned up. Trapping, manual removal, and orchard sanitation are the recommended controls. Pawpaw foliage carries its own natural insecticidal compounds, so it has very few serious pests and almost nothing reaches a threshold that a spray would fix. The webworm is the one that concentrates enough to matter, and it is easy to remove while nests are small and few.

Harvest time

as it ripens, and picking

1 job
HarvestingAt harvest

Pick by feel and smell, never by color

Start checking when the skin shifts from dark green toward lighter green and yellow, but judge by touch. Pick as soon as flesh softening is first evident: a ripe pawpaw gives when squeezed gently, the way a ripe peach does, gives off a strong fruity aroma, and separates from the stem with a gentle tug. Color alone is unreliable, so squeeze every fruit before you pick it. Fruit picked at first softening finishes ripening indoors within a few days, so do not wait for full softness on the tree. Pawpaw is climacteric, so a fruit that has begun to soften will complete ripening off the tree. A fully immature fruit will not, and no ethylene treatment rescues it. Once softening starts the fruit is too soft to handle within three to five days, which is why feel beats any calendar date.

After harvest

autumn, and putting it to bed

1 job
HarvestingAfter harvest

Refrigerate the same day you pick

Get fruit into a refrigerator at 32 to 40 degrees F and 90 to 95 percent humidity as soon as possible after picking. Expect only a few days at room temperature and a few weeks refrigerated. For longer keeping, scoop the pulp, discard the seeds, and freeze the pulp. Pawpaw has a thin skin, no wax layer, and soft custard flesh that bruises on contact, and it keeps respiring hard after picking. Cold slows that metabolism, which is the only thing standing between a ripe pawpaw and fermentation.

Pawpaw · Calculators & field guides

A little help in the garden.

Calculators for the figures. Field guides for the hands-on work.

Pawpaw · Yearly calendar

The pawpaw year, month by month

What pawpaw asks for, month by month.

Jan

No calendar activity is listed for this month.

MonthJanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Bloom
Prune
Harvest

BloomApril

PruneFebruary to March

HarvestSeptember to October

What each band means

  • Bloom — flowers open — pollinators working, frost on blossoms is the danger.
  • Prune — shape it now — cuts heal cleanly and structure is visible.
  • Harvest — picking time — check ripeness every few days.

These are the species' typical months — expect them a few weeks earlier in warm zones and later in cold ones. Watch the plant, not just the calendar.

Pawpaw · Ecology & uses

Ecology & uses

What it does for the garden, and what it is grown for.
Botanical illustration of Pawpaw

Asimina triloba

Pawpaw in the garden system

  • Understory layer tree
  • Hosts Zebra swallowtail butterfly (its only host)
Attracts
Birds, Butterflies
Moisture
Wetland / wet-tolerant
Deer
Browsed

Protect young plants

Origin
Native to North America

What pawpaw is grown for

✓ Commonly eatendon't eat skin or seeds

Use
Fresh eating
Use
Baking

Use like banana

Edible value
5/5

Harvesting & storing pawpaw

September - October.

Edibility, identification, and traditional-use notes here are general reference — not medical or veterinary advice, and not a claim that any plant treats or prevents anything. Medicinal ratings record how strongly a plant features in herbal tradition, nothing more. Never eat or dose a plant you have not positively identified. More on how to use this library.

Pawpaw · Varieties & cultivars

Best pawpaw varieties & cultivars

There are far more than these — the ones below are the named varieties of pawpaw people actually plant.

Named varieties of pawpaw differ in winter-chill needs, ripening time, hardiness, and whether they set fruit on their own — pick one that fits your climate.

14 varieties

Shenandoah

Also known as Peterson Shenandoah; selection PPF 1-7-1; USPP 14,452

Needs a pollinizer

Ripens
Mid Sept
Zones
5-8
Disease
excellent (few pests or diseases)
Size
15-25 ft tree
Pollination
needs a second variety

mild, sweet, custard-like; low seed — A flagship Peterson cultivar and a good beginner pick: large, firm, few-seeded fruit with a mild flavor that wins over newcomers. Like nearly all pawpaws it is self-incompatible and needs a genetically different pawpaw nearby to set fruit.

Where to buy ‘Shenandoah’

Story Thyme Farms may earn a small commission from these links, at no cost to you — it never changes what we recommend.

EtsyBrowse growers↗

Sources & plant identity

Know what you’re growing.
See where the knowledge comes from.

Botanical illustration of Pawpaw

Pawpaw

Asimina triloba

The plant, at a glance.

Botanical name
Asimina triloba
Plant family
Annonaceae
Growth habit
Tree · Perennial
Origin
Native to North America
USDA plant symbol
ASTR
Invasive risk
Low
Every garden is different.

Hardiness, size and timing vary with your cultivar, soil and climate.

Rooted in research.

University extension research, brought together with hands-on growing experience at Story Thyme Farms.

Explore Pawpaw’s sources6 reference links
for Pawpaw

Research from these sources

Alabama Cooperative ExtensionClemson UniversityCornell UniversityKentucky State Universityashs.confex.com

Publisher marks identify sources, not sponsorship or endorsement.

Questions

Pawpaw questions, answered straight.

Why isn't my pawpaw fruiting?

Most often: it has no genetically distinct partner nearby. Pawpaw can't pollinate itself — cross-pollination required (genetically distinct trees). Plant a second, unrelated one nearby; two different cultivars, or a cultivar plus a seedling, is the classic pairing.

Will pawpaw fruit in a warm-winter climate?

Pawpaw needs roughly 400-1000 hours of winter chill (hours between 32–45°F) to break dormancy and set fruit. Mild-winter growers should count their chill hours before planting.

Is pawpaw safe for kids and pets?

Pawpaw is commonly eaten and isn't considered toxic, but "commonly eaten" isn't a guarantee for any particular person or animal — allergies, quantity, and which part you eat all matter. One caveat on this one: don't eat skin or seeds. Never eat a plant you haven't positively identified, and check with a vet before letting pets or livestock graze anything new.

When do you harvest pawpaw?

September - October.

Elsewhere

Where pawpaw sits in the library.

Where pawpaw sits in the library

Cold-hardy pawpaws14Pawpaw pollination13Fruit trees31Native plants135Fruit trees for zone 515Fruit trees for zone 617Fruit trees for zone 718Fruit trees for zone 822All collections

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