I have a persimmon that I pack for winter into heated enclosure where temperature is kept above 20F. Before I pack it in fall I have to prune some of the longest branches that I can’t fit into the enclosure and I didn’t see any problems with these branches in spring. When I open it up in late March it is already somewhat advanced in waking up and it feels it is too late to prune it, because I will have to cut the tips that would otherwise produced fruiting wood. I can’t open it earlier as Feb-March are the months of big swings and we can get really cold nights… So I started to think - can I prune whole tree before I pack it up in fall? This will give me benefit of correct hormone distribution in spring. What problems it can bring?
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Galina,
My thought is that in the fall, trees are getting ready to go dormant. Pruning usually stimulates growth. If you pruned the whole tree, you would be waking it up. Without protection, your tree would be vulnerable when winter hits.
In reality, you protect it and won’t let temp go below 20 F. So, I don’t know if your tree would sustain any winter injury if you pruned it heading into the winter.
Would you consider pruning it in late summer or early fall to give it more time to harden up instead?
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Pruning summer or fall only create new long growths, in fall it doesn’t have time to mature. Tried that. So that wouldn’t help much.
You will have to be a trailblazer on zone-pushing persimmon growing.
I hope when it fruits, it won’t take as long as Nikita’s Gift to ripen (Nov).
I see no issue with a spring pruning on this persimmon
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You mean the new ends of the branches will get this hormone to produce fruiting wood even if cut later then normal?
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Persimmons produce on current year’s growth, not the previous year’s. So you can prune it now and still get fruit no problem.
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Only some buds will go forth to flower/produce fruit even if those are formed on new growth. Those buds are usually closer to the tips as you understand. Don’t prune all the tips off and see what happens. Has your tree at least flowered yet? Most of my Asian persimmons will at least flower after only a year or 2.
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Yes, it did flower last year first time, but dropped all the flowers.
I understand that, but what I read is that only new wood produced on the tip of the last year wood will flower. But the question is - what is the tip of the last year wood - actual tip that grew last year or tip of what left if you prune it in winter, or tip of what left if you cut it after waking up…
I’m also not exactly sure what that means. I’ll just share what I’ve noticed from experience, which is that even though I trim my persimmons very aggressively each winter to keep them at a no-ladder size, they still produce lots of fruit very evenly around the whole tree each summer. But I’ll be interested in hearing what you decide and how it works out.
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