Persimmon question

[tnpredator]

Stumbled on these persimmons a few years ago but hadn't really paid much attention to them til this year. These seem to start fruiting in the 5-6 ft tall range. The oldest ones there are 15-20 ft tall. The natives I'm used to grow grow a lot taller and thicker. Is there a type of native that starts producing earlier than others?

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[144]

Are they all in the same general area? I’m wondering if they are just suckers off a really old female tree root system. That could explain the earlier fruiting.


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[tnpredator]

Are they all in the same general area? I’m wondering if they are just suckers off a really old female tree root system. That could explain the earlier fruiting.


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They're spread out. Some a couple hundred yards from originals I knew of.

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[yoderjac]

Smaller doesn't necessarily mean younger. Trees go through stages. They start putting their energy into vegetative growth and root development first to ensure survival and then there are hormonal changes as the tree matures the causes it to put energy more into reproduction than vegetative growth. I too have some large females that grew quite large before producing their first fruit. I've had a few other native female trees that grew much slower that were the same age. I'm sure it was some combination of the availability of resources and the specific genetics of the tree. Stress can also cause a tree to produce fruit verses vegetative growth.

I now tend to graft all my native trees. I don't wait for them to flower where I can sex them. If I find a persimmon an inch or two in diameter and bark graft it, I often get the first persimmons in the third leaf after grafting.

This is a hybrid I'm experimenting with called Nikita's Gift, but it is a picture I happened to have handy that shows a small tree (granted it was grafted) producing fruit rather than putting on a lot of vegetative growth.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[ksgobbler]

I have been watching videos for grafting. I have 2 fruiting females on my place, and a bunch of younger trees that I dont know the sex of. What is the best video for grafting?

 

[yoderjac]

I have been watching videos for grafting. I have 2 fruiting females on my place, and a bunch of younger trees that I dont know the sex of. What is the best video for grafting?

For grafting persimmon trees in the field, I've have the best success bark grafting. I don't wait for trees to get old enough to flower to determine sex, Once trees hit an inch in diameter, I graft them. My sex change thread (http://www.habitat-talk.com/index.php?threads/sex-change-operation-transfered-from-qdma-forum.5547/ ) has some step by step instructions with pictures. I never watched any videos so I can't recommend one. Bark grafting is pretty simple. It does not require cambium alignment like other grafting. Good pressure and timing are keys. Wait until spring leaf out (squirrel ear sized at least) so the sap is running. Electrical tape is good for pressure. The other important thing is to remove water sprouts below the graft. When you get above 4" or so bark grafting becomes difficult.

Good Luck,

Jack

 

[ksgobbler]

None of mine are that big. Most are 3/8" around and 4' tall. My largest that are wild and fruiting arent that big around.

 

[yoderjac]

None of mine are that big. Most are 3/8" around and 4' tall. My largest that are wild and fruiting arent that big around.

Interesting. Just goes to show regional differences. The only trees I have that are small that are fruiting are ones I grafted. You might be able to use a W&T for trees that small. I've done that experimenting. Some have worked out fine, but I have more graft failures that way. It seems my persimmons would prefer to put on new growth of their own than push a graft. If I wait until my trees are about 1" in diameter and than cut them down and bark graft them, the root system has so much energy stored that they push out the graft easily along with water sprouts. All I need to do is to remove the water sprouts below the graft as they grow and that drives the energy into the graft. I've had limited success bark grafting small trees like your.

If you have native trees fruiting that small, they are clearly blooming. Mine don't typically bloom until they are larger and older (bigger than 1" in diameter). You might want to consider watching your trees for bloom next spring. Once they flower, you can sex them easily. My initial reaction would be to wait for the males to get larger before grafting, but perhaps your trees are different. There are two distinct strains of persimmons, northern and southern, which have different numbers of chromosomes. My native trees are the southern strain. Yours may be northern which could be part of the explanation of the differences. I often use scions from northern strains grafted to my native trees.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[ksgobbler]

My biggest fruiting tree is 15 ft tall, and was here when I bought it. There is another tree fruiting that is 6’6” tall. The big one may be 4” around. THe smaller one surely isn’t. The ones I planted will be 4-4.5’ tall going into the winter. I checked for flower this year and saw none.

 

[yoderjac]

I hunted tonight over a field with the Nikita's Gift persimmon shown in the previous picture along with several others. They are all bright red now. I noticed something started to eat on on the tree. I could be a bird pecking at it from the looks of it. The rest are all still untouched and hanging on the tree. Since there is so little quality food around (acorn mast crop failure) and fields are largely eaten flat, I wondered why these are not touched. So, I decided to pick one.

It was still pretty hard but starting to soften. It did not drop when I grabbed it, but I had to pull fairly had to break the stem. This may be an indicator that it will take a long time for them to fall if they fall. We have had several hard frosts with a low of 28 degrees a week or so ago. I took a small bite. It was a mix of a little sweetness with significant astringency. My guess is they have a couple more weeks before they are fully ripe.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

I checked the Nikita's Gift persimmons yesterday. I found there were only two left on the tree:

There were none on the ground. The tree did not look disturbed like something was climbing it, and they are low enough a deer could reach them, so I presume it is deer eating them. I picked the lower one. It was soft. The stem was so firm that rather than breaking, the center of the persimmon gave way when I pulled it.

You can see from the pic what gave way. The persimmon itself was extremely sweet. Too sweet for my taste. Other than the over sweetness, it was very good.

I don't hold out much hope for these as a deer tree. The stem is so strong that the persimmons would likely rot before they fell if some climbing critter did not get them. They are nice, large, and prolific, but like Lotus and Kaki, I doubt they will fall from the tree.

Thanks,

Jack