Winsorw:

I planted three Asian persimmons from Womack's in Texas in March, 2007. Varieties are Eureka, Hachiya and Fuyu, and they are grafted to American persimmon rootstock. All were very small -- about 18 inches -- when planted bare root. I favor bare root trees over container trees because I think they perform better over time.

These trees had a few blossoms in the spring of '08, and more in spring, '09, and one (Eureka) set and held 3 persimmons in '09. It is normal for the trees to set then drop fruit when they are not large enough to bear.

You don't define how many years make up a "few", but if it means your tree is in its 4th season, it should be able to set an hold a few persimmons now. All three of my trees have held about 18 persimmons each in this, their 4th season. The trees have all grown rapidly, with strong, healthy growth, and all are over 6 feet. I have even pruned out some very low and crossing branches.

What was the source of your tree, and was it containerized or bare root?

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

Hi Don,
Thanks for the quick reply. I got my jiro from a nursery. It was in a pot with root and some leaves. But I had a feeling it was a bear root not long before I bought it. It was taller than 18 inches though. So far I've never seen a bloom. I think it's probably on its 4th year. I'm getting worried:-)
BTW, is jiro the same as fuyu? Some websites suggested that they are the same.
Thanks.

I acquired a bare-root Fuyu three years ago. It was a rather large specimen with at least a 1/2" trunk diameter, more like 3/4". I've forgotten what the rootstock was but as I recall it wasn't a Persimmon stock but some other tree that I can't recall. It had no lateral branches and was top-cut at 5'. I cut another foot off, planted it, and have largely ignored it. I never saw any blossoms until this year. The blossoms are plain and easy to miss if you're not looking for them. This year it blossomed quite heavily. It dropped quite a few fruitlets but there are still a staggering amount left on the tree. They're about marble sized and I'm wondering myself if/when I'll need to do any thinning.

tcstoehr:

I wouldn't try to thin Fuyu at this stage of the season. If the fruits are only marble size, a lot more natural drop will still occur. You may end up having to do little or no hand thinning. Mine are still dropping occasionally, and the fruitlets are much larger than marble size.

You won't really know how many persimmons your tree will hold until August/September. But at that point, they will still be a long way from ripe. Those that do hold will continue to grow, even when they begin to color orange. They will hang on the trees right through October and into November. Where you live, maybe even into December. Leave them on the trees until they start to soften, which seems to take forever.

I wonder what kind of rootstock you have there, since I was unaware that persimmons can be grafted to any other than persimmon stock. I am quite sure mine are grafted to American persimmon stock, which is more vigorous than the scions above, and will provide excellent anchorage and hardiness. On my trees, the rootstock stem is clearly thicker than the grafted Asian varieties above. With persimmons, I think you can leave fruitlets that are right next to each other, as frequently happens, and they will both grow to full size. Last season I had 3 Eurekas grow in a cluster, left them all, and all three grew to over 3 1/2 inches in diameter. This year, there will be a lot more, both on Eureka and the other two varieties.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

My persimmons have proven extraordinarily good self-thinners - with no thinning I get fruit nearly as big as the store version.

Windsor, Fuyu is a class of persimmons, and Jiro is one persimmon in that class. To add to the confusion there is a "Fuyu" which is a variety in the class called Fuyu. Yes, its confusing, isn't it? All the Fuyu types are similar, and many nurseries get sloppy with the names for that reason. I have a persimmon I bought as "Fuyu" but when it came the tag said "Fuyu (Jiro)".

Scott

Don,

Persimmons can be grafted onto date plum rootstock, which was probably the case with tcstoehr's tree. This choice of rootstock is common in Western U.S. plantings but for some reason is not favored in the East. The advantages over American persimmon rootstock are that it does not sucker, it hardly self prunes allowing for multiple graftings, and it has a more fibrous network of rootlets rather than a dominant taproot, making more favorable the possibility of container culture. To one of my specimens I've grafted several varieties of persimmon and several varieties of date plum. The tree does show strong apical dominance, so to insure good vigor of the grafts, it's best to first prune back the leader to create multiple apical grafting sites rather than to just graft onto laterals.

Lotus (date plum) rootstock does ring a bell. I'm pretty sure that's the one they gave me over at One Green World.

scottfsmith,
Thanks for the explanation on fuyu and jiro. Maybe mine isn't jiro then:-)