I want to post a thread specifically to recognize this persimmon. I wasted lots of money and lots of time on lots of other persimmons Name your 30 best American persimmons
Mostly i figured out H-118 is hardy to my zone. Most of the others are not that great in my zone. I only post this because i have tried for years to grow persimmons like early golden and consistently failed. It is not only cold in the winter here it is very hot in the summer. It is windy, and really in most ways not ideal for larger persimmons. If you want a persimmon to start with make it this one. I know everyone has a lot to share on persimmons but forget that for a minute and go with what works first. I wish someone gave me that advice.
So far H-118 has been working well for me here. It has been in ground for 2 years, and has grown well for a grafted persimmon. It had a little tip die back at -21 below and a week of highs below zero or single digits, about the same as Mohler this winter, but is recovering well. The grafts on all my persimmons were buried under wood chips, and all survived. Downingtown Center had the most die back, but has responded with the most vigor, putting on over 24" of new growth from 6" above the graft. Prok had the least with essentially none, but that might be because it’s a couple years older. Pretty much none of my seedlings had any. Only the toughest grafted persimmons make it here as well, and so far H-118 has been one of the few to make the cut. As a side note, I’ve tried Meader twice here and both times it didn’t survive the winter. I planted it once again this year, but this will be its last trial for me.
My other advice for everyone is to grow your rootstocks 1-4 years first and make sure they are hardy to your zone. Growing local trees is even better. Make your grafts later. There is no hurry. If you graft your scion the first year or dont, it really makes no difference in how fast you get fruit. Graft higher up when you do graft and leave as much of the rootstock as possible. The only exception is if you plan to bury the scion because you know it is really not hardy in your zone. Persimmon growing is not mature yet, and therefore, there is no commercial rootstock. Pears have ohxf87 or apples have mm111 but for persimmon rootstock you must have good luck. Eliminate all points of failure systematically until you succeed.
This is what it looked like at season end (last winter).
Grafting it high on a nice stout rootstock gave it a very good first years growth. Had scaffolds started at the end of first growing season. I think that is ideal.
This season it has grown strong, bloomed and set fruit… many are still holding.
The second best if H-118 is the best… for me is American/Asian hybrid JT-02 / Mikkusu It has been the fastest to fruit and it hangs for a pretty long time. Not a good one to have if you dont like staking.
I wish their was a subscribe button so I could get feedback on the success or failure of your Meader.
OGW has H-118 and Meader in stock ATM.
Which is doing better after winters, H-118 or Prok? In Iowa I’m told Prok starts harvesting around Sept 21, which is before many apples. Tony in Zone 5 said H-118 harvested just after Prok. The selling point of Meader for a northern zone homeowner was the very long harvest window, so you could miss a week but still have more coming even after apples were done.
Threads to cross reference:
This one post is important because it names relative harvest times:
Yes, H-118 ripens in early September . The other thing few people say is that it has fruit set fast. My H118 already has fruit!
“Very large, high-quality seedless reddish orange fruit ripens early in September. Heavy producing strong growing tree bears annually and comes into bearing at a young age. It was originally known as H118 and is from the breeding program of the late James Claypool. Hardy zone 5.”
Summary
Ripens first or one of the first
Produces faster than others or one of the fastest
Good quality fruit
Not astringent tasting when ripe
Seedless but will produce in the absence of a male
Graft combatability is excellent
No winter dieback the first year or in future years like most persimmons have a tendency to do.
I grafted H118 to my wild dv rootstock last spring and it grew well.
But it was on a rootstock at my current home site (old orchard). I transplanted it in January and unfortunately that wild dv was a root shoot… it had one large root attacheed to it and that root had just a bit of fine root on it.
This spring… just a few buds (like 5) sent out some small leaves… and it stopped growing. It has held on to those few leaves and they are still green and look ok.
We had great rains this season… and the few times it did dry out… i gave it 5 gal of high N miracle grow.
I was hopjng to cause a growth spurt but so far it is just holding on to those few small leaves… and they are not growing any.
Hoping this H118 hangs on and makes it to season end… perhaps it will come on out next spring.
So I think there’s a caveat with work Rossiyanka persimmon, it doesn’t survive fluctuating spring weather well, that’s why it’s listed as zone 6 Hardy on the east coast, because it does not like good Maple syrup weather. The US East coast has the lastest Frosts in the world comparing to the average temperatures. In Europe the seasons (winter, spring, summer…) all come 2-3 weeks earlier officially.
In Russia it’s considered to be cold Hardy to -35c/-31F but I’ve seen it advertised to -40c/F and apparently it must survive in a continental zone 4a because of where it’s planted.
So in the Midwest I would expect it to survive.
I was told it won’t survive upstate NY, but I’d like to try sometime. I think I’ll try to plant it on the edge of a pine hedgerow, that might help regulate the temperatures a little more.
I checked lots of Russian sites about the Rossiyanka Persimmon, it is of course Russian, and there’s a lot of disagreement about how cold Hardy it is, but -27c/-17F or -35c/-31F are the most common numbers, but after some research, the main problem is that they are very late bearing trees and often don’t have time to get ripe in areas where winter gets colder than -20c/-4F , maybe in the US the sun shines more in the fall so it might be better, but spring comes later in the US so it might be even worse.
In any case it’s worth a try in 6a, it’s considered Hardy there, and if the fruits freeze they should ripens that way too.
There’s a very interesting list of varieties here and I’m not sure it’s true but they say it’s Hardy to -28c/-19F, and so much like Japanese persimmon I guess it is, Bull Heart Persimmon, Хурма Бычье Сердце, even though I don’t think it’s really that cold Hardy it’s worth a try, they say it gets more dwarfed in colder weather, and it’s usually grafted on full size Caucasian persimmon rootstock, American persimmon is more Hardy and maybe more vigorous so it would be worth a try probably.
Maybe somewhere it said Meader was cold Hardy to 20 degrees and that was misunderstood as Celsius when it was actually Farenheight.
Even British could have made that mistake.
Many of these links in the USA i can tell you are not accurate on cold temperatures. I cant say for sure about the Russian links. I personally never grew NG but it even dies back in Lawrence kansas sometimes. @39thparallel and I ate those and others mentioned here and they do taste excellent. Early golden is just barely hardy in 6a but my winters can be more like 5b. Most of these persimmons just are not cold hardy as reported. Remember 6a in the country is much colder than 6a in the city. My area is a cold spot. I have got some great advice from @jrd51@ramv@TNHunter@39thparallel@smsmith@snowflake@Barkslip@parkwaydrive@SMC_zone6@Richard@JesseinMaine@tonyOmahaz5@Fusion_power@Hillbillyhort@disc4tw @krismoriah@hobilus and many others on persimmons. When i say i feel really good about staking my reputation on H-118 being a good first persimmon to grow you guys all know i mean it. I will continue to try many of the other suggested persimmons. I hope i find one i like better than H118 in the future. Meader is reportedly very hardy even in zones 6a and 5 and yes some zone push to zone 4. When they say Rossiyanka is hardy to -13F i believe them but that does not mean in some cases it can’t take a dip down to -17F.
JT-02 is impressive for a hybrid at -22F. They just keep getting better.
I know not everyone is convinced until they see the fruit. i grafted these persimmon rootstocks over in 2023 to H-118 and it is now 2025. Persimmons in one year is impressive to me.
I grafted Early Jewel onto existing rootstock in 2022 I started producing last year – great taste! This June 80+ mph wind broke the graft off. And the tree was loaded this year. Now I start over. Pic is of the top of the tree that was broken off.
