The Golden Papaya that turned green

Here’s our personal experience about the transformation of the Golden Papaya we got from Lanao del Norte in 2015. We were fascinated when we saw the plant of Mrs. Teresita Bartolo because the fruits were golden yellow even if they were immature. The leaves were also more yellow than green.

Mrs. Bartolo was very accommodating. She welcomed us to her house and harvested one ripe fruit of her unusual papaya for us to taste. The fruit easily weighed more than a kilo. When it was opened, the flesh was very red and quite thick. It was sweet and juicy.

She was gracious enough to share with us the seeds which we germinated in our little farm in Teresa, Rizal. The seedlings had their characteristic yellowish green leaves.

When we planted the seedlings, most of the yellow ones succumbed to the harsh weather in our place. What were left were a couple of plants that had green leaves. No more the golden leaves we had admired in Lanao.

We were really surprised that instead of producing the big round fruits from which we got the seeds for planting, the fruits are elongated. We harvested one fruit on August 15, 2017 when it had a color break of yellow. The fruit was 13 inches long with a diameter of about three inches. The small cavity was full of seeds some of which were already starting to sprout when we finally opened the fruit two weeks later. Oh yes, it took a long time for the fruit to become more or less soft and ready for eating.

What we liked about the elongated fruit is that it is sweet and fleshy. Since it takes a long time for it to become fully ripe from color break, it means it has a very good shipping quality.

We are germinating some seeds. We will have to find out what other surprises the once-golden-papaya will bring us.

**** **** **** HITO TALK AT AGRI-KAPIHAN – The Agri-Kapihan cum Agri-Bazaar will be held on September 15-17 at the Quezon Memorial Circle in Quezon City. On Sunday, September 17, an expert of Hito Central will talk on hito culture and its potentials as an agribusiness. Hito Central has catfish farms in Sta. Monica, Lubao and Gutad, Floridablanca, Pampanga.

On September 15 and 16, there will be lectures on different topics on livelihood, farming and gardening. As usual, Friends of AANI will be making available their fresh farm produce like fruits and vegetables, herbal and wellness products. There will also be planting materials of exotic fruit trees, small farm animals like rabbits, native

ELONGATED FRUIT’S CROSS SECTION – This is how the cross section of the elongated fruit produced at the Sarian farm looks like. The red flesh is thick and the cavity is very small. It yielded a lot of seeds which will be used for further planting. If it...

BIG ROUND GOLDEN PAPAYA FRUIT – This is the big round fruit from the Golden Papaya of Mrs. Teresita Bartolo in Tubod, Lanao del Norte. This is the source of the seeds planted at the Sarian Farm in Teresa, Rizal. As it turned out, the fruit of the...