Inconspicuous flowers are usually borne solitary or in clusters in early May, hidden among the foliage on the previous year's branches. Their color changes from green to deep maroon and they have an unpleasant odor. The second year twigs have a white, diaphragmed pith. Leaf scars are crescent-shaped, with 5 to 7 bundle scars. The naked buds are composed of tiny leaves with numerous dense, reddish-brown hairs.
Flower buds are globose and stalked, and leaf buds are elongated and nearly sessile.
The smooth, light brown bark has gray blotches and small, warty projections. The pawpaw occurs primarily in the eastern US, from Florida and New York, west to Nebraska and Texas. This tree is mentioned in the chronicles of De Soto's 1541 expedition into the Mississippi Valley. In Iowa it is found in scattered areas in the Mississippi Valley, and in a few locations in the eastern and southwestern counties. Hardy from zone 5 to 8, the pawpaw prefers deep, moist, fertile, slightly acid soil and forms thickets in river valleys and bottomlands.