NEW SELECTIONS OF PAWPAW (ASIMINA TRILOBA (L) DUNAL)

Pawpaw or northern banana ((Asimina triloba( (L) Dunal) is a new promising fruit species in Romania. The first plants arrived in Transylvania from North America at the beginning of the 20^th Century, they were locally cultivated and remained unknown in the rest of the country. In 2000, we started a scientific study of this interesting species with the goal of examining the propagation techniques, orchard management and plant behaviour under Romanian conditions. Since then, several varieties and hybrids have been cultivated in order to establish suitable cultivars for new plantations. From a population of hybrids bred in Italy, two new selections were obtained: ‘Vitroplant 2’ and ‘Vitroplant 3’. A complete evaluation of the two selections was completed including the bark grafting response, phenology, plant description, fruit pomological characters, fruit physical and biochemical characteristics. ‘Sunflower’ was used as control.