The small branch is the rootstock (D. Virginiana) you need to cut this off.
As for the tall branch ! That is Kaki (chocolate). If it was me I wouldn’t cut the top off. I would put a t-post or a piece of tick rebar near the trunk and tied the branch/trunk to the t-post or rebar for a few years till it thickens the trunk a few inches. Make sure to check and replace whatever you use to tie to the trunk to avoid girdling.
Does anyone grow coffee cake without overlapping male blooms from other varieties? If you do/have, did you find there was enough pollination year after year, that most of your fruit could be eaten hard?
I really enjoyed coffee cake last year. It’s in its 2nd year in ground and it has 20 fruit, and there were no blooming male flowers near by except its own. About 5 have dropped recently, and they all had 3-5 seeds in them. Last year, the male and female flowers did not overlap, and it gave me 8 seedless fruit, but I am attributing that to it being so young.
I’ve seen on YouTube from Dave Wilson and others they recommend having both chocolate and coffee cake to help with pollinating, but my small sample size (kinda) shows I don’t need it.
We are in zone 6b with lake effect, a lot of my hybrid persimmons got split trunks and died back to the ground. The above picture is Nikita’s Gift, it still leafed out a bit but will the split trunk now affect fruit size and productivity? Should I replace the tree?
I have white tree guards on all my trees and I’m wondering if next winter should I paint the trunks to help avoid splitting, or does the white plastic guard essentially do the same thing?
Lastly, Americans are supposed to be hardier and yet most of my 1 yr old trees died completely. The hybrids all made it even though some had dieback. Why am I losing all the Americans?
You can try to paint the trunks to see if that will prevent splitting the bark. I also noticed when the ground is too wet and the tree absorbed too much water and when the freezing temperature came and the extra water also will cause the bark to split. In addition , I always buried my hybrid persimmons graft unions 8 inches below ground for insurance. If the top died to the ground level then the union below ground will respout to the same grafted varieties.
Tony
Tony,
Do you mound the dirt up around the trunk or dig the hole deep enough to set the graft union under 8 inches of soil?
Thank you!
David
Thanks Tony. Good tip on burying the graft 8".
I dug the hole deeper to bury the grafted Union.
Tony
That’s not uncommon. Small young trees with taproots take a few years to establish, especially if they were bare root. It’s not the Americans. Just the way it is and it happened to be them. I’ve lost small taproot trees also.
Have you tried leaving them buried to see if the scion end will sprout?
When is a good time to head cut to promote branching? Do I have to wait for the spring growth to stop? It has been growing since March and hasn’t stopped, but it’s only vertical growth.
I would keep the right branch as a central leader and support it to grow straight up. I would cut back the left competing leader to a third now. Next spring before the tree leaf out then cut back the central leader around 24 inches above the desired first tier side branches.
Tony
I’m in zone 7b, we’ve had weather constantly in the 70s to 90s the past several weeks. I have a Zima khurma tree that was grafted last year. I planted it in the ground last spring. My other persimmon trees have leafed out like a month ago. I did a scratch test near the tip of a branch above the ground graft, and a scratch below the graft. Both have green tissue under the outer bark. The tree has not awakened. This tree is so small. Like 14 inches. Hardly grew at all last year. Maybe an inch or two. Is it normal for a persimmon tree to do this? Is this a bad sign? I’m tempted to just buy a new tree that is much larger. Not sure how more patient I can be. I feel like I’m losing 2 years.
Can anyone tell me what is causing some leaves on my Saijo tree to turn brown? It’s only on two branches. Insects? If so, recommendation for organic, if possible, treatments?
Is this related? It’s on the same tree.
Thanks.
FWIW, my first year in ground chocolate took almost 2 months to bloom after my first year in ground coffee cake. Id just wait if it’s still green.
So I wanted a different plant to be where my David’s Kandy — planted October 2024, grew to 8 feet last year, cut by me to 1 foot below rabbit girdling and already regrowing strongly — was.
I went to transplant it. Cut as deep and wide as I could and was surprised how hard it was to move. Only then did I feel myself cut the thick taproot. Only then did I google and read about the taproot and persimmons being difficult to transplant / transplant shock because of it.
chat am I cooked?
For me persimmon trees that the taproot was cut usually get back growing good after a year of no growing.
The brown spots seem to have appeared on oldest leaves. I assume that this is a potted tree? Could it be sunburn? Damage from sun can happen when a tree that has been stuck indoors goes outside. The leaves are not yet adapted to the UV.
The damage on the leaf in the second picture looks mechanical. I’m guessing you had some strong wind and it bent and cracked the leaf.
Thanks Joe. The potted tree has been in the same spot for over a a month. And the brown wasn’t there a week ago. But did have some hot weather recently. Could the recent 90F days cause that? It seems like I don’t have to do anything about this. Is that right? Thanks.
I don’t think it could be just 90 F heat. I’d suspect a combination of heat and drying, except your younger leaves all look great. Also, in my limited experience, if Saijo’s roots dry out, then the leaves curl outside-in and never really flatten out again. Your leaves haven’t curled.
