Yep, you’re good to go, Jesse.
I still contest that no males are ever necessary for fruit production, that is at least for American or hybrids. I don’t know about Kaki’s because I never read up on it.
Jerry Lehman while standing in his orchard last Fall told our group that a gentleman growing all female cultivars in an area w/o any natives has all seedless persimmons on every tree in his large orchard & substantial (very good) crops.
Dax
Can anyone tell me from the time female flowers show up to fruit set and ripen? How long will it take before one can harvest a Nikita’s Gift? This is on an assumption of no fruit drop.
I’m going to guess your Nikita’s Gift will ripen in September or October depending on weather. They ripened here last year at the last of September / first of October.
I noticed that Nikita’s Gift drops a lot of fruit. More susceptible than other varieties. This has always bothered me about this variety, especially since I think it has a wonderful taste. Strudeldog, in his video, acknowledged better production for Nikita’s gift when a male was present. I personally am considering grafting a male branch to my Nikita’s gift next year.
AThanks, Clark.
@RUenvsci - that is not what I want to hear :). NG’s tendency to drop fruit!!!
This is the 2 nd year it has flowers. I grafted Prok and another variety on it. I hope those graft produce some male flowers. More importantly, I hope for some fruit set that will hang on this year.
@mamuag- I didn’t want to discourage you. That was not my intention! Just telling the truth that I find it very prone to fruit drop. Out of all my fruiting varieties, though, I prefer it the most!
No worry. I am just pulling your leg. It is good to know about NG’s tendency.
@tonyOmahaz5 warned me not to fertilize it as it would cause fruit drop. I accidentally threw a handful of fertilizer at the tree and realized what I just did. I was on my hands and knees cleaning up fertilizer. It is always something.
Yes, no fertilizer either! Hopefully you’ll get some fruit this year!
Wow. That’s gorgeous!
Dax
Dax,
The tree is 4 years old but quite small, barely 5 ft tall. I winter protected it every year up to now. I think I will not do it this coming winter as it is getting a bit taller this year.
I’ve never pruned it because it has not grown much.
I just came back from a friend’s house. He has a 6 years old Prok. It is full of flowers, more female than male but it definitely has both. His tree is 3 times larger and taller than mine.
Your tree has beautiful, shiny, leaves. I would never consider planting an ornamental such as a magnolia or another broadleaf evergreen when I could have what you have. A Magnolia virginiana is close to what you have there but a Magnolia will never give delicious fruit and furthermore the bark of persimmon is so much the greater.
Your Nikita’s Gift is going to be slower for any # of reasons but maybe the easiest to explain reason is that it doesn’t make an enormous tree to begin with. It’s its nature to be a smaller tree and ideally better for an orchardist.
I just wanted to tell you that thing looks stellar.
Dax
P.s. I didn’t know Prok has male flowers. Thanks!
Thank you. Usually soil in my yard is poor. That tree is planted in the middle of my flower bed (I ran out of space). The soil there is more fertile for my flowering plants. That could be why it looks well- nourished ( please don’t drop fruit).
As for my friend’s American persimmon. He bought a Prok and a Yates. One of them died. He is not sure a Yates or a Prok died. Whichever lives, has both male and female flowers. Thanks to this thread. I am able to differentiate them. If one can tell a difference between a Yates or Prok by their leaves, I would take pics of leaves to show you here. If not, I can show the fruit later in the year.
Last year he gave me a couple of fruit from this tree. It was fully ripe. The flesh was orange with jello texture. It is perfumely sweet. Too intense at first. My friend said he felt the same way when he first ate them. Now he likes them and found Asian persimmons to be too bland.
Dax,
Here’s what I found on the ground under my NG today. I did collect them together to take a group pic. None of them say cheese.
Sorry Tippy for all the fruits drop. One guy named Jian my mentioned making a ring cut on the bottom trunk to prevent fruits drop.
Tony
My Rosseyank and Prok are also around their fourth year. It sure seemed like they dropped a lot of fruit relative to how many flowers they produced, but I guess they’re still young. And I think I see some holding on, so this could be the year…
Mine could be long, torturing drops. There were all together 19 flowers ( yes, I counted everyone of them). Today was the first day of dropping. I am sure more will follow.
@tonyOmahaz5, I don’t think I could cut a ring around it at this point. The tree is relatively young. I also mulch it with compost in early spring. Have to remember not to fertilize it next year.
Cut through them to see if they formed seed embryos. If you see nothing you will need a pollinator.
I thought NG can set fruit without a pollinator!!
Supposedly it does fruit without being pollinated. My opinion though is that if you want good production from NG, you should have a pollinator around or graft a male branch to it. My NG trees experience a lot of fruit drop, and I think it’s becsuse the variety produces best when pollinated.
