For the longest time, I have been trying to find an old post on the former Garden Web site and I finally found it. Does anyone know if there are trees available from Carl Meyers’ breeding program? I am very interested in finding some. I have put the quote below.
It’s a tough call as so many of the new ones are so good, but I’d probably venture that my current favorite for eating out of hand is Prok. I also like Claypool C-100 which tastes just like Morris Burton (it’s seed parent) to me except the fruit is larger, a little firmer, and more attractive. Some of the varieties bred by Claypool, Lehman, and Compton are just as good if not better. Too bad historical hold-overs like Meader still dominate the web chatter and nursery market.
As for size, Jerry Lehman has bred some very large ones using Claypool stock as seed parents. I saw his 100-47 last fall, and it was the largest native persimmon I’ve ever seen. As big as the Fuyu persimmons I buy from the local produce store - only they taste better in my book. I much prefer the flavor of a Virginiana to a Kaki although I still enjoy kaki, too.
I found a nice seedless one last fall at the Muscatatuck Wildlife Refuge. I must’ve eaten about thirty or so before rolling myself over to the truck. Luckily, I still had room for a six-pack and some nachos when I got home.
Apparently, the site I stumbled upon used to be a cultivated orchard of seedless persimmons discovered and propagated by a fellow named Carl Meyers. The whole area was later expropriated by the government back around the '60s to create the wildlife refuge, and the trees I came across were the last remnants of that orchard. Very good eating with clean pulp and skin - about an inch in diameter. Never came across a seed so I gobbled them like they were big grapes. I found some history on it in the book, Our Memories of Home, on http://books.google.com/ "
Early Jewel Ripen in Mid to late Aug for us here in Kentucky at 2000 feet and is one of My Newest FAV
Also I have one of the Meyers Seedless as I have gotten it from @Lucky_P some 20 year ago and I do not know which of the Meyers it is but it tested to be a 60 Chromosome southern Dio VIR
SO here it in KY it is not seedless and is for sure nothing to write home about
Still with that said Claypools and Lehman’s and I am including Prok and a few others are the best American Persimmons on the Planet IMHO
How ever and I have just gotten it back the Knightsville and a seedling of it Named Contessa is in the winning category also
Hmmm. I don’t recall ever hearing of Carl Meyers persimmons before, much less having one. ‘Ennis Seedless’, yes, and I believe that I’ve read that it is a 60-C, so perhaps that’s the one I sent you, Cliff?
And, SFES, a 60-C local native that makes ~80% small(1") seedless fruits and 20% slightly larger, usually with a single seed. I’d thought, at first, that it might be a polygamodioecious male, but Jerry Lehman grew it and said it was only female.
Does anyone live near there? It seems scion from these trees should be exploited.
I’d like some advice on cultivars. My altitude is 5400 ft. and I’m zone 5. We often have late and early frosts. We sometimes have hard freezes when the trees are barely dormant, which causes the sap of the trees to freeze and can kill more fragile trees. I have given up trying Asian plums, but Asian pears seem to be fine. I’d like to choose two cultivars. I was looking at:
David’s Kandy
Kasandra
NC-10
Early Jewel
Prok is early and H-118/Early Jewel is too. Prok is really early and super large and super excellent. Early Jewel will get Phyllosticta but it’s cosmetic for the home gardener. Nice to see you, Rhonda.
Zone 5 you can’t grow David’s Kandy or Kasandra outside.
Jerry Lehman raved on and on. He really liked H-118/Early Jewel. Was always telling me how his family all liked it. He would always say after that, ‘the blemishes would not be seen once mixed with all the other persimmons’ for the pulp he sold. So, I’d say if Jerry Lehman was really hot on it and I’ll assume @KYnuttrees providing a photo of H-118/Early Jewel, then you might skip NC-10 unless it’s more worthy but that I cannot tell you, nor, have I had the chance of tasting an H-118/EJ.
Not sure if anyone is still interested in this, but I’m the guy who posted the blurb about the seedless persimmon. If you are still interested, I still have a branch growing here I could collect scion from. I also have another persimmon that I got from the same location from a tree barely clinging to life. It’s since died in the original location.
I was surprised to find that it wasn’t another clone of the seedless variety but a large sized seeded variety. I really liked it when it was fruiting, but between the possums breaking branches and recent tornado damage, it hasn’t been doing well. Afraid it might just die. Was hoping to get it into other grower’s hands since I think I am the only one with this particular mystery clone. It is either an antique cultivar or one that Carl found as the original tree was grafted. Kinda looks like the old Marion in the USDA yearbooks.
I’d put my email here but I’m afraid the spammers out there would start sending me spam about hard on meds and such.
John, thanks for posting! Here you will have a lot less spam than other sites the way mods have things formatted. How does this seedless tree stack up against others you might have tried?
Also do you have a location for the orchard? I would be interested in making it a pit stop on a trip west sometime to see if any trees are still around to browse.
Also, possibly to gather wood from any of the best ones to distribute…
