Persimmon Varieties for Deer -Transfered from QDMA forum

[yoderjac]

As many of you know, last year I started a project to convert many of my native American persimmon male trees to female: http://www.qdma.com/forums/showthread.php?t=47890
Thanks to Tickrancher in addition to using scions from one of my few native productive female trees, I was able to use several improved varieties, Prok and 100-45 on a few trees this year.
I still have a few more male trees than I need for pollinators that I will likely graft next year.
So, here is my question:
What are your favorite varieties for deer? What are the specific characteristic of the variety that you like? Are there any varieties you have tried that you don't like for some reason? If so why?
Thanks in advance,
Jack

 

[yoderjac]

No favorites?

 

[yoderjac]

Jack, all my persimmons are either natives or run of the mill seedlings from a state nursery. The native ones here get some kind of rust on their leaves, but they seem to be loaded with fruit most years.
I have planted two of the Jap trees from The Wildlife Group, but they are just whips. Good Luck and let us know what you go with.
Steve

 

[yoderjac]

Nikita's gift is a large persimmons like a japanese Fuyu, actually it is a hybrid between a Fuyu and a native. Don't know if it is non astringent yet; will probably be a few years before I know. I just set it out this spring. If your grafts take and are interested, maybe we can exchange some scions this winter. I have two Fuyus, one Nikita's gift I set out this spring, and a prolific native I have been getting scions from that is on an old homesite. I grafted the old homesite scions to my rootstocks on the last weekend in April, so far I have had 7 out of 10 break bud. I am planning on grafting some Fuyu's onto native rootsocks next spring, not for the deer but for me!!
I have always loved eating persimmons, but the Fuyu is the best eating persimmon I have ever tasted. Better than an apple.

That sounds great! I'd be happy to swap some Prok (if they take) for Nikita. I used 3 Prok scions and one 100-45 scion on one large male tree. In the past, I've had good luck with multiple scions taking on larger rootstock. I usually wait until Feb to select the best one to leave on the tree for the second year. Presuming I have multiple scions take on this tree, I should have some for trade next February.

 

[yoderjac]

Everybody has a favorite apple list but information on persimmon varieties is hard to come by.
I’ll try to get the ball rolling with a list of varieties recommended to me by the Indiana persimmon grower Jerry Lehman. The variety descriptions are paraphrased comments by Jerry and tidbits from the internet. My first grafts were in the spring of 2011 so there is still some time until I can make informed comparisons, but this list is a place to start and is in no particular order.
H-120: Large fruited tree breed by James Claypool of the Claypool persimmon breeding program. It is a very desirable fruit, excellent color with a roundish canopy, a heavy producer, and very precocious. Taste far exceeds expectation.
PROK: A selection from New York from the Cornell University breeding program. Grown out by John Gordon of Amherst New York. It produces very large fruit (2.25") which are nearly seedless. Very productive. Tree is very ornamental with large, attractive leaves, ripens in August in Kentucky. It is a favorite persimmon for cooking and eating out of hand. It ripens long before frost.
J-59: It has a nice orange/red flesh and is very good. J-59 is a Claypool cross. It is a very upright grower. It is excellent for puddings and pies, but best known for its aroma and true persimmon taste.
C-100: A Claypool cross which tastes like Morris Burton, its seed parent. The fruit is larger, a little firmer, and more attractive. Morris Burton can be slow growing and slow to come to bearing.
WS-8-10: is a Jerry Lehman cross, very large, mid-season, nice color, sweet and intense.
100-27 S: is very late, good producer, good taste, and good for wildlife (deer) and people food.
Lena: (Mitchellena): Winner of Mitchell Persimmon Festival in 1955. Fruit is squat and soft with tender skin and an attractive red color. Good in cooked products. Flavor holds up well in frozen pulp. It ripens early and over a long period.
100-45: Has large fruit with a nice rose blush, sweet and very good.
100-46: The fruit is large and late with a nice rose blush, sweet and very good. 100-46 has the best fall leaf colors of any I have.
H-118: A Claypool variety and daughter of Juhl. It has early ripening with excellent pulping qualities. H-118 has improved color and clearness of pulp and is just as early or earlier.
These varieties have been superior to the usual named varieties in taste tests but I doubt any deer participated in the tests.

 

[yoderjac]

Well, I've been doing some research the past couple days. Here is my current thinking:
Presuming all this spring's grafts take I'll already have:
- My local prolific female trees (18) American
- Prok (3) American
- 100-45 (2) American
I'm considering adding next year:
- Rosseyanka (Hybrid)
- Nikita's Gift (Hybrid)
- Lehman 100-29N (American)
- Meader (American)
I'm thinking the hybrids and 100-45 can cover the mid season period, Meader can cover the early season and Prok even some pre-season. My thinking on the Meader is that since is is self-pollinating, I may be able to convert more male trees to female and rely on Meader for pollination not only of itself, but of nearby trees.
Is this a reasonable assumption?

 

[yoderjac]

Jack, do you know of a good source where I could buy some small trees of the different cultivars that you are going with? All of my native persimmons ripen extremely late, and I would like to add some varieties that ripen over a longer time frame. I'm not going to have the time for any grafting and just need to buy some trees. About 15 trees of 5 or 6 earlier cultivars are all that I'm interested in right now and would likely want them this fall.

Thanks - Steve

Steve,
Dave Osborn's sex change article got me started grafting and Tickrancher got me started in specific varieties by sending me some Prok and 100-45 scions (THANKS!). I think I now may be addicted.
There are places you can buy grafted trees that I have found by doing a google search, but I have not bought any, so I can't recommend any. I think I ran across a small nursery in Ky on my search that specializes in persimmons.
I'm going a different direction. You can buy the Oriental varieties on american rootstock. They can produce fruit fairly quickly, but they are generally small trees. This is great for the guy growing them for harvest, but I'm not so sure I want small trees for wildlife.
The problem with buying the American persimmons is that many take quite a while to produce fruit. My native trees might be 8 years old before producing fruit. It is my understanding that if you bark graft to well established mature root stock (say 2" -4" in diameter). You can get fruiting in two years. Tickrancher or others more experienced than I am can correct me if I got this wrong. So, my plan is to acquire scions and graft to my established trees. My first passes will be grafting to my established males since they aren't producing fruit. If it turns out that I really like the characteristics of one of the improved varieties, I may even graft some to existing female trees.
For scions, my first hope is to swap scions with folks here. I also found a good source for scions at Englands : http://www.nuttrees.net/. I'm trying to compile a list of varieties along with the characteristics and drop dates, height, etc like the one Tickrancher has in his post. Right now, I'm up to 44 and I'm sure there are many I've missed.
My secondary plan is to buy native persimmons from the Virginia Department of Forestry. I can get 50 seedling for $75 bucks. My plan is to heal them in next February in strategic locations and just let them do their thing. Years down the road, they will provide mature rootstock for me to graft to. I have had such good success with bark grafting so far, I'm comfortable with this route.
Hope this helps,
Jack

 

[H20fwler]

I'm new into persimmons, I preordered twenty five 4' northern persimmons from Cold Stream Farm out of MI for next spring to try. I'm really looking forward to getting them out to see how they will do.

 

[yoderjac]

Jack, That small vendor in KY is probably Nolin Nut Tree Nursery. I got some paw paws and chestnuts from them and they come with a good root system. The trees are high, but good quality. I may have to do some grafting too because of the cost if I get many other types of persimmons.
When you get your list completed I hope you share it with the rest of us.
Your plan sounds really good. I could do the same thing at my place with volunteers that come up in the fence rows. Persimmons pop up like crazy around here.

Yes, that name sounds right. I believe England is also out of Ky.

 

[yoderjac]

When you get your list completed I hope you share it with the rest of us.

Right now I'm up to 56. I doubt the list will ever be complete. I'm sure there are hundreds more, but I can't find much of a description of most of them. The list is primarily focused on American, not Oriental.
I was going to attach the list, but for some reason, the site is limiting PDF files to very small sizes. Perhaps Banc can change the limit. I can't think of any reason PDF files would need to be size limited any more than JPG or other files. My PDF file is only 58Kb but the current limit for PDF is 19.5 Kb. If they change the limit, I'll upload it. If not and you want it, just PM me your email address and I'll email it to you.
The items highlighted in green represent the varieties I currently have and the ones highlighted in yellow represent the ones I'm currently exploring for next spring.
Thanks,
Jack

 

[yoderjac]

I had a conversation with Mr. England today of England's Orchard. He has a lot of persimmon experience. It was quite enlightening. It shows you just how inexperienced and naive I am when it comes to persimmons.
My original list was:
- Rosseyanka (Hybrid)
- Nikita's Gift (Hybrid)
- Lehman 100-29N (American)
- Meader (American)
Rosseyanka and Nikita's Gift are not a good fit for wildlife. The fruit has to be picked, it does not fall from the tree. I need the fruit to fall for deer.
He had nothing bad to say about Lehman 100-29N. Looks like that might be a good fit.
My rationale for Meader was that it is said to be self-fertilizing. I presumed that meant it had both male and female flowers and it could fertilize other female trees nearby. Mr. England tells me that it isn't really self-fertilizing. Evidently what happens is that pollen from other trees (chestnut is one possibility) tricks the tree to think it has been fertilized so it sets fruit. The fruit is seedless since it hasn't really been fertilized with compatible pollen. So, it won't work like I thought. Second, he says it is an average persimmon on its best day and most other varieties outperform it.
So, I'm back to square one...almost. Mr. England introduced me to a guy who has many years of grafting persimmon for wildlife. I just made initial contact, but I hope to learn a lot from him.
I also took a step for the future. My rootmaker cells are pretty much sitting empty now that my Dunstans are out of them. I only have one partially full rack with Jujube root cuttings going right now. So, I bought a pound of persimmon seeds that have been stratified from England's Orchard as well as a grafting knife so I don't have to use my pocket knife any more. My plan is to get them started and heal them in after my logging operation is done this fall. Those that make it will be future grafting rootstock.
Thanks,
Jack

 

[yoderjac]

I planted Yates, Meader, and Prok persimmons basically for the deer this spring. If I can get to them before the wildlife I plan to try them myself. Hopefully I will know if they like them within 5 years.:)

 

[yoderjac]

Hey Yoder, did he happen to name any other varieties that would be good for deer? Id really like to try grafting next year, but am unsure which of England's wide variety of scions would be best for this purpose

Deer will eat just about any persimmon variety they can get to. If you are looking for a tree that ripens in October (at least at the England Orchard location in Ky), he has a variety called "Wonderful". This is large fruit that is the prodigy of Yates and and an F-100 male. It is a medium size tree. It does drop its fruit.
It is probably one of the varieties I will try. It would be good for both people and wildlife.
He also mentioned F-56 and JT-02 might be appropriate for wildlife but less so for people. We got distracted before I got details on these. I don't know anything about them.
He is testing a couple hybrids in development that do drop fruit but they are not yet available for sale.
I will continue to look into this and follow up with the resources he provided. As I learn more about varieties that have specific characteristics folks would want for wildlife, I will post the information.
Thanks,
Jack

 

[yoderjac]

Wow! I really had my eyes opened tonight. I had a conversation with a true wildlife persimmon expert who has been grafting persimmon and other fruit and nut trees specifically for deer for many many years.
I sure learned a lot in that hour! Here is my take away regarding persimmon varieties.
1) None of the Oriental persimmon varieties work for deer. They simply don't drop.
2) As for hybrids, he likes Nikita's choice. According to him, the fruit does drop from (at least in his area). That is different than I heard from Mr. England, but I think this one is worth a shot.
3) Many of the American varieties that drop are fine, but the problem is that they are improved for commercial use and human consumption, not wildlife. Regardless of some of the info we've seen, they are all designed to drop relatively early. This is done for commercial purposes.
Persimmon trees by their vary nature, have a broad variety of characteristics between individual trees. So, what you need to do is find trees that drop their persimmons at different times across the entire season from Sept through Dec.
I hope to be getting a variety of scions from trees that drop at different times from him for grafting next spring. Once I have them established, I'll be happy to share. However, the other thing we should all do is to keep track of when our own (or nearby in the area) prolific trees drop. We can then swap scions to get dropping trees throughout the season.
So, get out your notebooks and get ready to record your drop times this year!

 

[yoderjac]

Great info Jack. I will try to watch my native persimmons closer this year, but I am almost certain that all my trees drop too late for hunting season in mid November. There are several trees in the middle of my farm that are over 60+ feet tall, and they are usually loaded. I'm going to be more aware this year and will let you know if I have any that come in earlier than I am thinking.
All of my trees get rusty looking leaves, but it doesn't seem to hurt the fruiting.

 

[yoderjac]

Native Hunter,
I think that leaf coloration is not that atypical in the fall. Here are a few more tidbits:
Somewhere, I was told or read that after bark grafting persimmon scions to established root stock, you can get fruit in 2 years. This guy says that you may see the first fruit in 2 years but don't count on a significant crop for about 5 years.
He tells me that some persimmon scions grow too quickly. They can get so large so fast that they can get broken off in higher winds. Most folks temporarily stake them to provide added support and to keep birds from landing on them before they are ready. That is what I've been doing. This guy grafts 1,000 trees some years, so he has found some efficient methods. Instead of taking the time to stake them and then go back and remove the stakes later, he prunes his during the first summer to keep the weight of the scion easier to support by the graft.
I had received this tip from Trophy Doe earlier, but this guy told me that he doesn't use the expensive grafting supplies. He uses flagging tape to tie in his grafts. He says that it is stronger, provides better support, and is less expensive.
Now I ordered a grafting knife from England's since I've been using my plain old pocket knife. It has worked well for bark grafting, but I'd like to learn other grafts and I didn't know if the knife would make a difference with those. Well, this guy who is grafts in such volume doesn't want to mess with a grafting knife. He uses a $2 disposable knife from Lowes made by Task Force:

He likes it for a couple reasons. First, you don't need to worry about sharpening it. It is light. When he teaches folks to graft, he uses the notches in the blade to tell folks how long to make different cuts. His students using the same knife have an easy way to measure.
I don't know if he uses this for all of his grafting or just bark grafting persimmons. He does a lot of grafting of a lot of species.
Thanks,
Jack

 

[yoderjac]

This is great Jack. I have a note pad at the ready!

 

[yoderjac]

A few more words of wisdom I just remembered from the expert. One of my concerns was ensuring pollination. I have left at least one large male with each cluster of trees where I grafted the others to female. I was considering allowing water sprouts on the male portion of a few of the trees grafted to female to develop in year 2 after the graft to provide pollination so I could graft the remaining male in the cluster.
He told me that this isn’t necessary if you have native persimmons growing on their own in your area. He said that many female trees will have a few male branches and that insects can pollinate from trees that are quite far away.
So, it looks like I’ll have some more male trees to graft next year!

 

[yoderjac]

I received several pounds of 90-chromosome persimmon seeds today from England's Nursery. I planted about 225 into mesh flats tonight. After they germinate, I move them to rootmaker 18-cell trays.

I may get a few more trays tomorrow, but there is no way I can use all the seeds I got this way. I may have to direct seed some of them.
After our logging operation is complete this fall, I'll plant them directly from the 18-cell trays. My plan is to use any of these that survive as future root stock for grafting.

 

[yoderjac]

I ran out of mesh flats and could not find any locally. I did not want to wait for the shipping if I ordered them on-line, so I tried a DYI. I took thin aluminium lasagna plans, grouped them in 5 and used a paring knife to cut large holes in the bottom. I'll use these with newspaper like you do with the mesh flats to start more seed.

I now have well over 500 seeds in trays and have not yet put a dent in the bag of seed that England's Orchard sent.