J = Japan (kaki from Japan are known to ripen on the grafted-trees)
C = Chinese (kaki from China are known to be ripened mainly with CO2 gas)
PCA = Pollen Consistent Astringent
No matter the pollen had at it, it will always need ripening off the tree.
PCNA = Pollen Consistent Non Astringent
This means that pollen does nothing. And that the fruit ripens on the tree.
Now, when pollen is introduced to plants that can change flavor. This is the letter: V = Variable
PVNA = Pollen will change the fruit flavor. Itās Non-Astringent still so the tree will ripen the fruit vs gas.
PVA - Pollen will change the fruit flavor. This time the A means it needs gas (commercial ripening - CO2 gas) to ripen since the tree alone is not capable of ripening the hanging fruits on it.
A = Astringent so it must ripened off
NA = Non-Astringent so it may be ripened on the tree (or off: kitchen/tables in basements/garages)
I must of read for an entire day and then again thru the week to understand this. (Yet) itās so simple!
This is/These are all the things that happen with growing: hybrids or kakis or both together and each grafted cultivar has itsā own way of ripening/flavor. American persimmons simply have or donāt have seeds.
Jerry Lehman always stated via email/in-person/phone:
āAmerican persimmons are as fruitful/(precocious & prolific)w/o males and their flavor isnāt effected with or w/o the presence of pollenā¦ and that a completely seedless orchard of female-only-cultivars is entirely possible without surrounding pollen.ā
This is helpful, but it might be more clear to use another descriptor for astringency instead of āripening on the treeā. Perhaps ripe when soft or something like that?
For PVA fruit, are you saying thatās itās impossible to obtain ripe fruit without CO2? Seems oddāwhat happens in nature? And what did people do before industrialization? Iām just learning about persimmons and am not familiar with PVA.
My exact thoughts as I read @Barkslip post. Dax, or anyone else, do you have info about natural ripening? Can you put them in a plastic bag with an over ripe apple or some other fruit? I know that people use alcohol, but that might be hard to come by in certain situations.
I have shelving 1/2 of my basement walls and Iām going to lift them off any shelf with hardware cloth rectangles that will set on each shelf. In combination with this advise from @PharmerDrewee via a message to him:
" I just leave them in a box with apples or bananas if I want to accelerate softening. I keep mine in the cold garage to slow things down so I can eat them at my leisure. Kaki can store for a long time in the fridge too."
Freezing them for 24-hours and removing to eat them after they un-freeze removes all astringency. A lot of people just pick and freeze and eat at their leisure until next-years crop.
@FarmGirl-Z6A ā A PCA persimmon will lose astringency naturally as it ripens, but typically the persimmon has to be 100% ripe, which means the flesh is very soft and gooey.
A PVA persimmon is like a PCA that gets some help reducing astringency from modest ethanol production by the seeds. So as I understand it (I donāt grow them myself), a PVA persimmon will lose its astringency naturally as it ripens, but maybe slightly faster than the PCA. So maybe it will be edible when it is a little firmer, less gooey.
A PVNA is like a PVCA that gets a lot of help reducing astringency from significant ethanol production by the seeds.
Using an external source of ethylene (e.g., a bag with an apple) will hasten the process of ripening. So either a PCA or a PVA or a PVNA will ripen a little faster and therefore lose astringency a little faster given the ethylene. But it will still be soft / gooey when ripe.
Using ethanol or CO2 stimulates a process different than ripening. These treatments accelerate the loss of astringency without materially impacting the process of ripening. So either a PCA or a PVA will lose astringency quickly with these treatments, before the fruit is 100% ripe. This means that the fruit could be eaten while still somewhat firm, even crunchy.
Who, or where, is there an authoritative source for defining Persimmon cultivars in terms of PVNA, PVA, PCNA and PCA classifications. And / or, a classification or description of traits?
For example, who defines that Saijo is PCA (if it truly is PCA), general production (output), ripening time, and other details? Iām just curious, as Iāve spent 4 hours learning about the āSaijoā sold to me, and why itās very very dark fruit flesh is likely an indicator that itās ā¦ not a Saijo
so i suppose the nursery that sold me the tree, that produced this fruit, didnāt sell me a Saijo as labeled? The seller has Chocolate Persimmon in their inventory.
The āSaijoā i planted in March 2023 fruited this fall. i began looking into Saijo fruit texture and color, actually read a little about PCA vs PVA, and opened-up a can of worms and pretty sure i aināt got a Saijo :/.
Do you remember what the flowers looked like and do your fruit have seeds? Chocolate has a lot of male flowers, so you will see little clusters of 3 flowers, sometimes male flowers on the outside and a female in the middle, but often all male flowers. And you would definitely have seeds.
Do you have pictures of the seeds? Itās possible to identify persimmons by seed.
Saijo has giant seeds in a tiny fruit. Chocolate has more medium sized seeds.
nope BUT iāll be looking for those flowers in the spring! and yea, the seeds were a clue as i began to learn about Saijo and PCA.
the nursery replied and apologized; they confirmed Chocolate Persimmon and will send me a Saijo. i didnāt expect such a quick resolution.
i learned a lot about PCA / PCNA / PVA / PVNA, the Chocolate and Saijo Persimmon. thank you for chiming in!
i can get you a pic of the seeds but the nursery replied and apologized; they confirmed Chocolate Persimmon; i didnāt expect such a quick resolution.
BUT, the seeds in my ?Chocolate Saijo? (whatever the fu%$ it is are long. thatās what stands out about these seeds relative to the other varieties i grow. longggggg seeds. thank you for chiming in!
Iām combining some info i found here and other sources. Does anything look inaccurate here.
Iām interested in any bolded questions i have as i donāt want to present any false information to others.
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PCA (Pollination-Consistent Astringent):
Doesnāt matter if pollinated by a male or not, always astringent. Need to wait till its soft to eat.
Can pick it hard off the tree and let it ripen till its soft (some varieties more gooey or some more jammy) (or let it get soft on the tree for the animals to eat ).
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PCNA (Pollination-Consistent Non-Astringent):
Doesnāt matter if pollinated by a male or not, always non-astringent.
Can pick it hard off the tree and eat it while hard. Can also just let it get soft as well and eat then as well (doesnāt not need to get to the āsuper-softā stage, can be eaten at all levels of softness).
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PVA (Pollination-Variant Astringent):
The fruit is usually Astringent (when not pollinated by a male flower).
The fruit when pollinated (when pollinated by a male flower and forms seeds), the flesh around the seeds loses astringency and develops dark spots. The parts of the fruit not directly around the seeds remain astringent.
This may create an inconsistent eating experience (is this true? like the seeded parts will soften/ripen faster than the outsideā¦ so when the outside parts catch up, the seeded parts are maybe a little too ripe?).
The seeds help reduce astringency from their modest ethanol production (maybe therefore ripens/softens faster than a PCA?).
It needs gas (commercial ripening - CO2 gas) to ripen since the tree alone is not capable of ripening the hanging fruits on it. (is this true? why not just let it ripen on a table like a usual Astringent?, why does it need gas (for both pollinated and not-pollinated fruit?)?
I thought someone said the seeds produce ethanol, so may even help ripen it faster?).
Pollen will change the fruit flavor (does it actually change the flavor vs an unpollinated PVA? How, is it pretend usually sweeter?).
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PVNA (Pollination-Variant Non-Astringent):
The fruit is usually Non-Astringent (when not pollinated by a male flower).
The fruit when pollinated (when pollinated by a male flower and forms seeds), the flesh around seeds darkens (though remains non-astringent). The dark coloring is sometimes seen as undesirable for fresh markets, though the fruit is still edible when firm.
@jrd51 mentioned āA PVNA is like a PVCA that gets a lot of help reducing astringency from significant ethanol production by the seeds.āā¦ (wait, whats a PVCA? hah)ā¦ Why does that matter, if its already non-astringent? does it help it become edible faster if pollinated?
Pollen will change the fruit flavor **(does it actually change the flavor vs an unpollinated PVNA? How, is it pretend usually sweeter?).
Note: There might be differences/caveats in here for Chinese vs Japanese types that i didnt find info yet (main one i found being āJapanese PCNA cultivars rely on a group of 6 recessive genes to reduce accumulation of astringency compounds. Chinese PCNA is from a dominant gene that speeds up conversion of astringency compounds to stable forms.ā).**
This quoted statement regarding PVNA is wrong. A PVNA is astringent when not pollinated. Unseeded, it behaves like a PCA.
Technically, you should write āPollination Variable.ā The presence of pollen per se is irrelevant. What matters is the production of seeds.
Also note, what is variable is mainly astringency and color. Seeds remove astringency and the modified tannins make the flesh turn amber / brown. There may also be a change in flavor but that is secondary.
Also, my excerpt quoted above should read āA PVNA is like a PCA that gets a lot of help . . . ā PVCA must have been an unnoticed typo.
A PVA is like a PVNA with too few PV alleles to do the complete job.
I have IKKJiro and Cardinalā¦ which are PCNA types (right)ā¦ IKKJ produced fruit this year, Cardinal has not yet. With IKKJ all fruit tree ripened for meā¦ some to red and softā¦ some only to deep orange. Some that were deep orange.. we ate them firm.. very good no astringency. Some we picked in November and let remain on the counter until they turned red and softā¦ these were good but not as good as the few that tree ripened to red and soft on the tree during warmer weather. The deep orange fruit were good whether picked from tree when warmer.. or after sitting on the counter for a few weeks.
I have a Saijo.. grafted last spring. PCA type.. I understand that this type will be astringentā¦ Until ripe color and soft. Hopefully most of these will tree ripen for me with my long hot season.
I am used to this type of ripeningā¦ With american persimmons. Is there anything else I need to know about this PCA type ?
Lastly.. will be grafting Smiths Best/Giboshi this spring to a nice large wild DV rootstock in my orchard.
Giboshi.. is PVNA type.
I understand that it taste very good unpollinated (must wait for ripe color and softness)ā¦ Or if pollinated you may get a little better flavor ?
I am hoping for unpollinated.. since we do not want seeds.
Is it likely that one of my other asians (Cardinal, IKKJiro, Saijo).. or hybrids (JT02, Kasandra, Nakitas Gift, Journey) could produce male flowers and pollinate Giboshi ?
My IKKJiro fruit this yearā¦ were completely seedless.. and we hope they stay that way.
@TNHunter ā I think youāve got it down pat. Your PCNAs are always non-astringent. Your PCA (Saijo) will lose astringency when ripe. In my experience with PCA Kakis (Saijo, Sheng) they lose astringency somewhat more easily than Americans. Your PVNA (Giboshi) is good, whether seeded or not. Mine is young but Iāve gotten plenty of fruit. So far, itās not as good as the PCAs but Iām hoping for better as the tree matures. I have it on good authority that the unseeded fruit makes extremely good dried fruit.
I wonāt say that itās impossible for one or more of the varieties you mentioned to produce a male flower. But I grow almost all of those names and I believe that male flowers have been either nonexistent or extremely rare. So I donāt think you should worry about seeds.
are long. thatās what stands out about these seeds relative to the other varieties i grow. longggggg seeds. thank you for chiming in!