Like you, I recently bought a potted,grafted Shenandoah 'tiny' plant and transpotted it into a bigger pot, where it has grown OK with 2 small branches developing full-sized healthy leaves. An identicle-looking tiny grafted KSU Atwood from the same seller that was packaged the same, growing in the same kind of nursery pot, repotted by me the same into the same kind of tall pot on the same day in the same soil mix with the same fertilizing and the same watering and the same Sunlight....never had one bud on the tiny scion grow out. It's rootstock sent out a couple shoots, but even these declined and died. I have used Miracle Grow, Super Thrive, and some granular fertilizer to nourish both. My conclusion is that the tiny root system is not reliable to support the tiny grafted scion. I have more confidence in clipping off the scion and regrafting it to a mature paw paw with a developed root system. I do not know what the patent restrictions dictate, but if I am going to invest $$ on a valued scion that is only being kept alive by an immature, very vulnerable rootstock, that is not a safe bet to make again. It would be a whole lot better taken care of if it was grafted onto a "Mango paw paw that has been in the ground for several years and is 8 or 9 feet tall". I wish that paw paw roots on tiny plants were as eager to grow and hardy as,.. say,...mulberries. Maybe that would be the best focus of additional paw paw research. Vigorous hardy rootstocks.

Allowing suckers from a rootstock to grow indefinitely without being checked eventually results in a decline of the scion because it is living as a parasite on the stock. The stock will, if allowed eventually make itself whole again by growing its own new top and pushing the scion aside. Where a plant is grown from a cutting the top and roots are all a single organism that is not going to have one part sapping another, like a cancer. Different parts of the same tree do get priority for energy use at different times of the year. At this time of the year the roots are allowed to grow longer than they are at any other time. During other seasons other parts of the plant are where energy use is concentrated. It's like an organization with a budget, with higher fund use being assigned by the budget committee to different departments at different times. In the case of a tree it is an energy budget instead of a monetary one. The leaves manufacture a certain amount of food which is then portioned out to different parts of the plant. Dormant periods are gotten through by storing energy in stems and roots.

If you opened this thread, I will add the evolution of my fukushu kumquat grafted on rio red grefruit seedling in 2014. It is now in 15-20L airpot, with generic potting soil amended with perlite, keramzit and bark. It is in the new location for 2 months, and this week flowered nicely. New little branches grew from the vertical stem (the last watersprout), growth that stopped now (right after full moon).

Thanks, Brian! Steve, this one is on a C-35. The other Meiwas I grafted are mostly on C-35, but I think I also have one on Kuharske and/or US-897... I'll have to check. John, I could do that, but I figured that the trifoliate leaves were still making food for the plant. I didn't think those leaves would cause issues; what effect do they have? Thanks! -Tom