Morning, Karen, yep, the seller did boast, 'in a good way,' but he was comparing the size of his plants to other papapa sellers. Most papayas are sent as seedlings, 5-7" tall. With the root stock and trunk, the papaya, I bought was 20"+. Karen, we'd have to sell our house and cars to pay for a 20' papaya tree and shipping, lol. I've eaten papaya, few times considering cost, but didn't notice an odor. It's actually a very delicious fruit. Papayas here are over-priced and unripe. After a few days, like most other fruit,' they go from unripe to mold. Did you get lost because the Botanical Gardens was large? That'd must have been scary, 'since you were a kid.' In IL conservatory's, it'd be difficult getting lost, lol. Karen, there are different papaya varieties..some grow much taller than others. Some reach 30'. One reason I bought this variety is it only gets 8' tall, so does well in containers. The reason fruit trees are grafted: Grafted are hardier, more disease resistent, tolerant to colder temps, and flower/fruit quicker than non-grafted trees. Wow, playing house w/Hibiscus flowers. Much nicer and cleaner than mud pies, lol. Sounds nice. Good memories. I'd love to see SA, but it's not in my cards, (or bank account) either. We only travel to US states when there's a funeral. In fact, we've never been on a real vacation. When our son graduated boot camp, we flew to GA. Guess, you can say, that was our vacation. :) Using papaya seeds as a laxative. Does one eat the seeds, as is? Interesting. God really knew what He was doing when He designed the world. Foods can be used for more than eating the meat. Anyway, yep, the break is in the un-ID'd rootstock. No it can't hurt to try, but after looking at both plants, I'm not feeling very optimistic. Tropic, like you, I too grew up loving plants. My aunt and uncle had a farm in MI. We'd visit on weekends. At 5-yrs-old, I recall gazing in the fields. Greens as far as the eyes could see. The scent was so comforting. Spying corn growing from a stalk was amazing. They also had farm animals, but I was too young to remember. At 11-yrs-old, upon my request, my dad bought garden seeds which I sowed in the back yard in Chicago. The corn ended up being horse corn, lol. I had no idea carrots and onions grew underground, so never found them. lol. But, the tomatoes grew large and tasty. Also had a 2 or 3 watermelons, 'our dog ate them,' and 3 pumpkins. I removed pumpkins in early Oct, but carved too early, so by Halloween, the pumpkins ended up in the trash. Mush! Funny, you liked rice plants. Mind if I ask where you grew up? For some reason I assumed rice had to be grown in water?? lol. Never saw a rice plant. 4-yrs-old, not only taking an interest but attempting to sow? rice seeds! Hardwood cuttings. Tropic, the only part that can be rooted, if possible, is the papaya trunk. Amcour. Howdy. Growing outdoors they might break from winds like Karen mentioned. The only reason my papaya broke is because winds knocked it down, 'long drop.' From the starte I doubted papaya would ever grow huge fruit, lol, but who knows, right? Mini fruit would have been nice, even if inedible. I don't know anything about the life of a papaya, 'in the ground/hardy areas,' but even if the tree died after fruiting, fruit falls, split, and out pop seeds. In warm climates, the seeds would root on the ground, and start over. Voila, new trees. This is all speculation, but isn't that how most trees produce? BTW, if my papaya lived 10-yrs, I wouldn't have considered it short-lived, lol. Thanks everyone, Toni

Hey Julie, my problem in making suggestions for you is one of too many possibilities, not too few. You clearly have a good deal of tree knowledge, what with just the listing alone of what you already have in your yard. For my part-and I don't think you're going to do this-I still think the right flowering crab, ie. one with good resistance to apple scab and fireblight, and one with persistent fruit, to be the finest, most long-lived group of smallish, ornamental trees available for the upper midwest. But I get that you already have an apple there, so may not want to simply replace with what is essentially another type of apple tree. One thing I would do-and this too may be rejected-is cut the ailing thing down, get it and you out of its and your misery (Hope grammar police aren't reading), and make way for the new guy. Trees grow so much faster than many peeps seem to think, and I believe you may as well get the right tree started in the right place, rather than stuffing one into the shade of a dying neighboring tree, to the detriment of both. Just my opinion. +oM

Oh boy. You are in a rather marginal zone for grapefruits. As you can see. I would prune off all those weird, stubby branches that are dead. Prune back to just before the branch collar (don't prune into the collar, but just past it). Also, prune back any die back until you get to healthy wood. Then, fertilize and let's see if your tree will come back for you. The photos are very hard to see because they're sideways. If you fix the orientation, and re-load so their orientation is correct, sure makes it a lot easier for forum members to get a correct view of your issues. Some of the splitting on the trunk and branches I suspect is frost damage. So, be sure you cover your tree when you have frosts. The big scar that looks like a bite mark may be just that - hard to tell - but it appears to have healed. You should not be having growth flushes in January. When did you fertilize prior to that? In your area, I would not put down any fertilizer after, say, beginning of September. You don't want to encourage any flush during possible frost/freeze times. Don't fertilize in the spring until chances of frost are over. Patty S.

Hi, Gina - thank you for the kind words. I now have it in a south facing window, that is mostly covered by a light filtering shade, 4 feet from a west facing window in a fairly bright room, and next to a humidifier. So it's sort of between a S and W window? I wondered if I did a full repot and root trim if I could possibly put it in a slightly smaller pot? I plan to use a mixture of 1:1:1 potting soil, perlite, and repti-bark, and possible put some empty bottles in the bottom as ballast. Yes, you'll be able to put it in a smaller pot after the root reduction, but do make sure you don't cut yourself short insofar as space for roots to run, given you'll be adding ballast. I also hoped to turn it into a standard or “mother/daughter”. It has 6 stems that all seem to be from the same plant and I wonder what the best way to convert it would be? A mother/daughter arrangement would look like the larger tree hovers protectively over the daughter tree. When you select the two trees, be sure the larger doesn't dirsctly overhang the smaller and shade it out. The two should be offset a bit. This can usually be accomplished best by allowing the two trunk lines to be directly above each other for a distance before the daughter's trunk turns toward you. This arrangement has a front and a back for viewing purposes, but it should be rotated regularly so all sides get their share of light. Remove the surplus stems.branches unnecessary to the composition by pruning them back to the trunk. Start them as cuttings if you like. I read about removing stems to accomplish this but also about leaving stems, because those leaves have value to the plant, while you focus on strengthening one stem or binding a few together? Honestly, I just read so much information at once in the past couple days that I am a little overwhelmed :) Not pertinent at this point - save that for later. I would like to give it the correct soil and conditions for it to thrive. I think you can expect good results with what you proposed above, and the ballast will definitely work in your favor. Is it too late for a repot and root pruning in zone 7b? If there was no pressure to get the plant out of the pot/soil it's in now, I'd probably wait. If you think the combination has potential to dump a serious problem before next spring, go ahead and repot. It would be best if, after the repot, the plant could be sited outdoors in dappled or open shade and out of wind while it recovers. You have a longer growing season than I do and I set Aug 1 as my last repot date for Ficus ..... but all my trees are outdoors, which makes a very significant difference. Start fertilizing when you're seeing new growth. Make sure you keep the roots WET for the entire duration of the repotting session. Have everything ready to go before you start. Add a wick to the pot too, if you like. Questions? Al