This article is about the various species of pawpaws in the American plant genus Asimina. For the common pawpaw of eastern North America, see Asimina triloba. For the unrelated tropical papaya fruit often called papaw or pawpaw, see Carica papaya. For other uses, see Paw Paw (disambiguation).
Asimina is a genus of small trees or shrubs described as a genus in 1763.[2][3]Asimina is the only temperate genus in the tropical and subtropical flowering plant family Annonaceae.[4]Asimina have large, simple leaves and large fruit. It is native to eastern North America and collectively referred to as pawpaw. The genus includes the widespread common pawpaw Asimina triloba, which bears the second largest edible fruit indigenous to the United States.[5] Pawpaws are native to 26 states of the U.S. and to Ontario in Canada.[5][6] The common pawpaw is a patch-forming (clonal)understory tree found in well-drained, deep, fertile bottomland and hilly upland habitat. Pawpaws are in the same plant family (Annonaceae) as the custard apple, cherimoya, sweetsop, soursop, and ylang-ylang;[7] the genus is the only member of that family not confined to the tropics. Fossils date to the Cretaceous.[8]
The common name (American) pawpaw, also spelled paw paw, paw-paw, and papaw, probably derives from the Spanish papaya, perhaps because of the superficial similarity of their fruits.[11]
Description
Flower of Asimina reticulataFlower of A. triloba
Pawpaws are shrubs or small trees to 2–12m (6.6–39.4ft) tall. The northern, cold-tolerant common pawpaw (A. triloba) is deciduous, while the southern species are often evergreen.
The leaves are alternate, obovate, entire, 20–35cm (7.9–13.8in) long and 10–15cm (3.9–5.9in) broad.
The flowers of pawpaws are produced singly or in clusters of up to eight together; they are large, 4–6cm across, perfect, with three sepals and six petals (three large outer petals, three smaller inner petals). The petal color varies from white to purple or red-brown.
The fruit of the common pawpaw is a large, edible berry, 5–16cm (2.0–6.3in) long and 3–7cm (1.2–2.8in) broad, weighing from 20–500g (0.71–17.64oz), with numerous seeds; it is green when unripe, maturing to yellow or brown. It has a flavor somewhat similar to both banana and mango, varying significantly by cultivar, and has more protein than most fruits.[5]
Species and their distributions
11 species and several natural interspecies hybrids are accepted.[1][12][13]
Asimina angustifoliaRaf. 1840 not A. Gray 1886 – Florida, Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina[14] Regarded as a synonym of A. longifolia by some authorities.[15]
Asimina manasotaDeLaney – Manasota papaw native to two counties in Florida (Manatee + Sarasota); first described in 2010[17] Not recognized by some authorities.[18]
Asimina triloba(L.) Dunal – common pawpaw. Extreme southern Ontario, Canada, and the eastern United States from New York west to southeast Nebraska, and south to northern Florida and eastern Texas. (Annona triloba L.[24])
Ecology
The common pawpaw is native to shady, rich bottom lands, where it often forms a dense undergrowth in the forest, often appearing as a patch or thicket of individual, small, slender trees.
Pawpaw flowers are insect-pollinated, but fruit production is limited since few if any pollinators are attracted to the flower's faint, or sometimes nonexistent scent. The flowers produce an odor similar to that of rottingmeat to attract blowflies or carrion beetles for cross pollination.[25] Other insects that are attracted to pawpaw plants include scavenging fruit flies, carrion flies and beetles. Because of difficult pollination, some[who?] believe the flowers are self-incompatible.
The leaves, twigs, and bark of the common pawpaw tree contain natural insecticides known as acetogenins.[27]
Larvae of the zebra swallowtail butterfly feed exclusively on young leaves of the various pawpaw species, but never occur in great numbers on the plants.[28]
The pawpaw is considered an evolutionary anachronism, where a now-extinct evolutionary partner, such as a Pleistocene megafauna species, formerly consumed the fruit and assisted in seed dispersal.[29]
Cultivation and uses
Asimina triloba is often called "prairie banana" because of its banana-like, creamy texture and flavor.
Wild-collected fruits of the common pawpaw (A. triloba) have long been a favorite treat throughout the tree's extensive native range in eastern North America.[5] Pawpaws have never been widely cultivated for fruit, but interest in pawpaw cultivation has increased in recent decades.[5] Fresh pawpaw fruits are commonly eaten raw; however, once ripe they store only a few days at room temperature and do not ship well unless frozen.[5][30] Other methods of preservation include dehydration, production of jams or jellies, and pressure canning. The fruit pulp is also often used locally in baked dessert recipes,[31] with pawpaw often substituted in many banana-based recipes.
↑ Flora of North America: Asimina triloba. "Asimina triloba". Flora of North America. Retrieved 13 July 2011.
↑ Boning, Charles R. (2006). Florida's Best Fruiting Plants: Native and Exotic Trees, Shrubs, and Vines. Sarasota, Florida: Pineapple Press, Inc. pp.172–173. ISBN978-1-56164-372-1.
↑ Werthner, William Benjamin; Werthner, Evangeline Hippard; Kienholz, Aaron Raymond (1935). Some American trees an intimate study of native Ohio trees. Macmillan. OCLC681865854.[pageneeded]
↑ Sargent, Charles Sprague; Faxon, Charles Edward; Gill, Mary (Wright) (1933). Manual of the trees of North America (exclusive of Mexico). Houghton Mifflin. OCLC680282467.[pageneeded]
↑ Boone, Madison J.; Davis, Charli N.; Klasek, Laura; del Sol, Jillian F.; Roehm, Katherine; Moran, Matthew D. (January 2015). "A Test of Potential Pleistocene Mammal Seed Dispersal in Anachronistic Fruits using Extant Ecological and Physiological Analogs". Southeastern Naturalist. 14 (1): 22–32. doi:10.1656/058.014.0109. S2CID86809830.
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