Pawpaw

I have a pawpaw tree with lots of fruit that I would like to collect and trade the seeds with folks here. This one tree is in deep woods. If I let the fruits ripen and fall, squirrels and raccoons would get them before me. If I pick them too green I am afraid the seeds won't be viable. Any ideas?
Has anyone germinated pawpaws? I know they have to be stratified, but I thought I read somewhere they shouldn't dry out? Should they be shipped as whole fruit maybe?

I also have some pawpaws, but did not know much about them.
However we did go to a paw-paw festival a few years ago, and picked up some literature. To pick pawpaws ripe (they say under ripe pawpaws will not ripen) look for fallen fruit first, the rest of the tree may begin to ripen soon, and when skins start turning yellow, it is a sign that the fruit is starting to ripen. Try wiggling the fruit and if stem separates from the fruit easily, the fruit is ripe.

I cannot find the directions on germinating them. But I did have success that one time following the instructions. First I did buy the big fruit (Mine are seedy piddly things I have a hard time remembering to go and look for) at the festival and then saved every seed. Then I put them in a bottle with moist sand in the refrigerator all winter. In spring I potted them up, and they sprouted.

Check this out:
http://www.hort.purdue.edu/ext/HO-220.pdf

Ester,
Thanks so much for the information, That is exactly what I was looking for! I did some searches and just didn't seem to get the right one.
I thought I had remembered that the seeds shouldn't dry out. I am also supposing that the fruit should ripen on the tree for the best germination rates. Don't know if I can beat the squirrels to these or not.
What conditions are you growing your trees in?

The trees were growing here in the wild (hillside by the creek) when we bought the property. We were told we had pawpaws, but took us awhile to discover which they were. We took one of those nature walks with a ranger and then found out they had these insignificant looking brown flowers in spring too!

We just checked last night and we do have quite a bit of fruit this year and not ripe yet, probably because of the weather. Will have to keep checking them. They are supposed to produce better in sun, so one of these days we shall plant our seedlings on this side of the creek.

I went back to check my trees. Not so many paw paw seeds like I thought. I do have some nice little trees though. Maybe next year I will have some to trade with people. It is a neat tree to have I think. I guess they are really hard to transplant, (after reading the website you gave me) maybe you should try germinating the seed on the sunny side?

As I said in my first post I had success germinating seeds - once! They are now two year old seedlings in pots in the greenhouse floor, we haven't had time to move them out. Last time we looked they were still alive. Should check them again....

Plants in the ground are practically impossible to transplant, my neighbor's brother has tried to dig up plants to take home to Detroit and they all die. I gave him two of my seedlings last year and he's got them in the ground and they are doing well. A lot of "new plants" in the ground are just on runners, and even if they look like a forest, if they are all connected, they will not fruit, I heard or read somewhere. You have to have two separate plants at least.

Very interesting what you say about the runners. This is probably very true in this case. I looked far and wide for a parent tree in this particular case and didn't see any around. The larger (yet still small) tree in this case must have sent out the runners. and the original seed was probably carried in by the creek when it got out of the banks. So I'm thinking maybe next year if I have seeds from another tree on my place I should plant them in this grove.
I love the blooms on these.

Here's a link I found a couple years back when I started researching them...everything you ever wanted to know about pawpaws and then some. http://virtual.clemson.edu/groups/hort/Faculty/pawpaw/info.htm

Wow! thanks for all the links. Some of the URL's look to have moved.
I am anxious for next year. Hope I can harvest some fruit. We had a terrible hail storm earlier this year. I usually have more fruits and nuts to harvest.

I received some PawPaw seeds from Sam Norris (who invented Pardancanda). He was working on producing a seedless pawpaw, but passed on before his idea came to fruition. I kept them as he sent them in a plastic ziploc bag in the refrigerator until planting them in the winter into gallon pots which I left on my cold porch. There was NO sign of germination, and I moved them to the back of the yard. About August, they surprised me by coming up and growing fast. I was told that the seedlings do grow better with good sun, although the trees are fine in shade, even deep shade. Also, it is true there is a long taproot making them hard to transplant. Perhaps there is a double dormancy? Cold followed by heat? There was a great pawpaw site I was on once where there is a recording of the song about 'picking up pawpaws'.

This young pawpaw patch of mine is definitely in the shade.