American Persimmon

[Bonsai Nut]

Thought I'd start a thread on my journey to try to locate a decent female American Persimmon. I went from assuming that we didn't have any on our property to eventually locating three females and quite a few males. Very hard to capture pictures because the females are large trees - which is perhaps why I didn't see the fruit at first. The good news is that if we have them, there is a good chance that I can locate some more elsewhere on our property. The fruit is ripening right now, and it drops from the trees when ripe... and it attracts deer which is something we don't want



A grove of young trees:


Adult bark:


Young bark:


Large fruit on branch:




I am slowly working my way through our property and clearing out scrub / vines / blackberry bramble. Add in Bradford Pear removal and Chinese willow removal, and these trees have been hidden in plain sight.

 

[KateM]

Are you planning to remove them to not attract the deer?

 

[Michael P]

How do they taste? Last fall I found a female at a nature preserve that had sweet fruit directly off the tree.

 

[KateM]

I have some I grew from seeds and fruit is sweet when fully ripe before they fall off...

 

[Bonsai Nut]

Are you planning to remove them to not attract the deer?

Not at the moment. It was more of a general comment. We have deer everywhere, so I don't need another reason for them to come close to the house

I am hoping to find enough females that I can try to trunk chop a few to see how they respond, and whether it impacts flowering and fruiting.

Starting next spring, I am going to be hard pruning some of my males to see how they respond, as well as defoliating a few trees to see if I can get the leaf size down. I have also flagged a couple to move into containers to see how they respond to transplanting. In a perfect world, after locating a tree I would do a trunk chop while it is still in the ground so that it recovers quickly from the first severe pruning. Then, a year or two later, I would transplant the tree.

 

[Bonsai Nut]

How do they taste? Last fall I found a female at a nature preserve that had sweet fruit directly off the tree.

They taste really sweet... with a texture like a soft peach. If the fruit were lower to the ground, I would pick some for cooking. But right now the female that bears the most fruit bears it very high in the branches. The tree is around 60' tall.

 

[KateM]

The bark on older ones is amazing.

 

[NashsMan]

The bark on older ones is amazing.

I love the bark on older persimmon trees!
A week and a half ago we drove out to Marshall, Virginia (@markyscott territory) to see a friend's property where I'm helping them brainstorm ideas for a new house. They have 15 acres of mostly awful invasive trees, vines and shrubs. Our agreement was my ideas for some yamadori trees.
There are hundreds of persimmon trees at the pond edge, most of them 2-4" caliper. I asked my friend to cut back on the poison ivy and other invasives in a few areas so I can go back in late October to mark/chop/pre-dig a few trees.

I grew up on a farm in Western North Carolina and we had maybe 10 persimmon trees on 100+ acres. I've never seen so many !
Also, the fruit was already ripe and sweet; in my memory that nerr happened util after a frost.

 

[rockm]

Fwiw. I would not “pre chop” and let a tree sit for a year. For many reasons. If you have a lot of deer for instance. Chopping bring all their new vegetation down to “deer level”. While the tree is struggling to push completely new green growth from underneath thick bark in the spring deer are at their max for hunger. After winter They eat most anything they can get their mouths on. You e just provided them with an appetizing treat at mouth level

Additionally removing the top leaves the tree to competed with trees and vegetation that it had supppressed with shade when it was tall. It may not win the battle to regenerate before being shaded out

I’ve done “pre chops” on a few trees around here in Virginia in the past. None worked out very well. Your mileage may vary of course depending on locality and circumstance

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

The bark on AP is incredible, always thought they could make a fun bonsai project. There is one on a golf course I played several times years ago and the bark reminded me of arakawa JM. It is really amazing in person.

 

[KateM]

My fruit is still green.
Young bark, about 15 years from seed, is getting nicer.

 

[Potawatomi13]

You may already know but you can grow these from root cuttings and that could give some great early trunk movement without wire . It would also assure you had a female tree from the beginning.

 

[Gabler]

I have also flagged a couple to move into containers to see how they respond to transplanting.

I have had tentative success repotting in June this year. The trees are all still alive. We'll see how they do over the winter.