Fun Fact #391 Clonal Growth

 Fun Fact #391

Clonal Growth

By the time of the Third president of the United States (Tomas Jefferson) Pawpaws were deemed a rare delicacy given to foreign visitors to the white house. Thus it came as no surprise when France requested some seeds to begin their own Pawpaw patches at home. Their eagerness turned bitter however when after only 40 years the pawpaws began to overrun the fields in which they were planted. 

This is due to the tree’s main form of propagation: Clonal growth. Pawpaws are native to the understory of the forests in which they live and thus to propagate faster rather than taking a whole year to create new seeds they will often send out roots which form new trees. These patches of pawpaws only accelerate in their growth as time goes on and are surprisingly difficult to kill as the tree is one of the only known species which can shed its outer bark in response to harmful chemicals, it’s bark is full of natural pesticides, and its roots can grow deep resprouting long after the original tree was chopped down. 

Today few pawpaws grow outside of North America (mostly in Germany), and France has laws against any tree which exhibits Clonal Growth. Additionally the French dialect common to the Midwest region of the United States is named after the Pawpaw due to their association with the fruit.