Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
Miller Persimmon in a frost pocket where apples and pears mostly failed this year.
Native Hunter Apples 2023
- Thread starter Native Hunter
- Start date
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
Thanks, I planted 6 persimmon trees (3 Miller and 3 Deer Magnet) near that spot. I didn't realize it until I started digging, but it was the hardest and worst ground I have ever dug in. I had shovels and an iron digging bar, and it took me 4 hours just to dig holes for 6 trees. I wondered if they would even live. They did start out slowly but seem to be taking off really well now.
Two unusual things have happened. One tree turned out to be a male - which I don't understand, because it came from a reputable nursery. This was probably just some kind of unintentional mistake. The other thing is that I ran over one of the trees by accident and broke it off at the ground. I let it come back from the roots with the intention of topworking it later on. However, before I topworked it, the tree started making beautiful fruit from the rootstock. In fact, it is more loaded this year than either Miller or Deer Magnet - and it drops over a nice long period of time.
Persimmons are definitely tough. I will likely topwork the male I talked about next spring.
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
Miller on high ground yesterday.
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
My first Prok persimmons. Looks like they will be October ripening for me. These are from a seedling Male I topworked to Prok two years ago.
Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
What do persimmons taste like?? Never had one.
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
They are extremely sweet and soft. I would say that they remind me of the taste of a cantaloupe, except that the flesh of a persimmon is much softer. I will generally eat a few off of the trees, but I really prefer eating them made into bread, cookies or cake type dishes. There are dozens of recipes on the Internet of different ways you can use them.
Deer are crazy about them, and other animals are too. Even coyotes eat persimmons. I think the extreme sweetness is something that is kind of unique compared to most of the other wild foods that deer encounter. However, I will also mention that nothing is more bitter than a persimmon if you try to eat one that has not ripened.
A common misconception is that persimmons do not ripen until they have experienced a frost. This is not true. There are many that ripen well before any frost. It is possible, however, that frost does indeed help some later ripening varieties to ripen by exposing them to the cold temps.
Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
Thanks for the taste info. I wish we could plant them - for deer. Bears & sweet things ........
We have a FEW rare wild persimmons here - if one can be lucky enough to find one. I'd like to try one sometime, just to say I tried one.
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
I have an unusual persimmon story for you. Below is a tree that I have named The Blind Luck Persimmon.
This tree started out as a grafted tree, but in one of my not so smart moments, I backed over it with my truck. It broke off below the graft, and I was left with a rootstock stub. I sawed it off at the ground line and put the cage back up. My plan was to let it come back from the roots and topwork it in a few years.
It did indeed come back, but I quickly noticed that it started flowering early with female flowers. I then just let it grow to see what kind of fruit it would make without topworking. Bottom line is that it has ended up being one of the best young persimmon trees I have ever seen. It drops over a long period of time, the fruit is large, and the crops are heavy. This is the third year of bearing and it gets better each year. Yes, Blind Luck is nice.
This tree started out as a grafted tree, but in one of my not so smart moments, I backed over it with my truck. It broke off below the graft, and I was left with a rootstock stub. I sawed it off at the ground line and put the cage back up. My plan was to let it come back from the roots and topwork it in a few years.
It did indeed come back, but I quickly noticed that it started flowering early with female flowers. I then just let it grow to see what kind of fruit it would make without topworking. Bottom line is that it has ended up being one of the best young persimmon trees I have ever seen. It drops over a long period of time, the fruit is large, and the crops are heavy. This is the third year of bearing and it gets better each year. Yes, Blind Luck is nice.
My son and I convinced my daughter - at age 12 - to sample a green persimmon - while wearing braces. She said she could still taste it two days later. Now, at age 35, she still gets mad at us when we mention it.
Beautiful and nice size! Makes a man think he needs to add some prok to the growing deer candy and magnet I have just so I can eat them
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
Don’t ever pull that trick on someone in the mob. You could wake up missing.
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
I like the taste of Arkansas Black right off of the tree. I’ve read that they get even better in storage, so we will test that in December with the ones I have stored. This one on October 8 was tasty.
Blackberries aren’t just for spring. If you grow the right varieties you can also have fresh berries in the fall. New cultivars produce fruit on both the primocanes and floricanes. Pictures below taken on October 8.
Blackberries aren’t just for spring. If you grow the right varieties you can also have fresh berries in the fall. New cultivars produce fruit on both the primocanes and floricanes. Pictures below taken on October 8.
blueKYstream
5 year old buck +
I picked my first AB early October last year. It was very hard, but otherwise not too bad. I didn't get any apples this year. What type of blackberries are you growing or recommend growing?
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
The double cropping blackberries that I grow are some of the first ones starting to be sold a few years ago, and mine have thorns. They have now come out with some double cropping varieties that are thornless.
This one is highly praised, but I have no personal experience: https://www.starkbros.com/products/...dc_bsoO4HU9HtFxDbWGLuobMtNZszyQhoCAskQAvD_BwE
This year I also planted some thornless Ouchita and Arapaho plants that are single crop berries. You can ask me about them next year. Both of these are supposed to be good.
I also have a single crop thorned berry that I grow which was given to me by someone. It makes massive berries, but I don't know the cultivar. Actually, the taste of the wild blackberries I pick is better than anything else I have tried so far.
Last edited:
Native Hunter
5 year old buck +
Yes, I only grow the thornless ones at home in my yard and keep them caged. If a cane starts poking outside the cage it will get browsed off immediately. My yard is a popular deer destination at night due to all of the different things I grow.
Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
Learned something here. I didn't know BB's could have a fall crop, or that there were "double-croppers."
BrushyPines
5 year old buck +
To me they taste like a nutty orange popsicle lol
blueKYstream
5 year old buck +
I just went to England's Orchard where he has a bunch to try. The American persimmons had a variety of tastes. To me, I tasted mostly mandarin-orange like flavor. Some tasted like brown sugar and cinnamon. Some tasted like pumpkin with notes of cinnamon. There's a few other flavors I'm sure but that was mostly what I tasted. Some of the hybrids had a thicker consistency, bigger and tasted like honey or perhaps a mix of American flavors and honey. I compared notes with some other people there after the fact. We agreed on a few and disagreed on a few. I'm not experienced enough to know if the fruits are variable or the taste is somewhat subjective. Others can dive deep into taste but I guess I don't have a sophisticated palette.
