How can you tell the “gender” of the Papaya fruit you are eating?

A - fruit from a hermaphrodite plant

B - fruit from a female plant

C - fruit from hermaphrodite plant that has been affected by carpellody in which the stamens develop abnormally into carpel-like fleshy structures. Usually they are a smaller size fruit, the flesh is fine to be eaten.

Note that seeds from hermaphrodite papaya plants generally segregate into hermaphrodites and females at the ratio of 2:1.

Seeds from female papaya plants segregate into hermaphrodite and female at a ratio of 1:1 if fertilised by pollen from a hermaphrodite plant or a ratio of 1:1 male to female when fertilised by pollen from a male plant.

This explains why for commercial production it’s best to grow hermaphrodite plants as all plants will bear fruit. For a female plant you would need a male plant to produce fruit so it’s not very economical in terms of use of space.

At Exotica NZ we only use breeder seeds of Calina IPB9 to ensure hermaphrodite plants for better fruit production