I live in the Willamette Valley and my fuyu persimmon has very yellow leaves. This is its 1st full year and I’ve never grown one before, so I don’t know if the new leaves are always this yellow. There’s also a great big 20 foot tall fuyu persimmon growing down the road that also have yellow leaves. I’m wondering if this is just the color persimmon leaves are in the spring or, if not, what kind of deficiency might be causing the yellowing
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From my observations in Portland, yellow-ish leaves are a key identifier of persimmon trees.
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Normal. Leaves on all my persimmons look like that. You’ll notice newest leaves are a bit more green. All leaves will green up over the next month or so.
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Agreed, give it another month or so to darken up. Some varieties seem to be more yellow at first than others. Jiro is especially pale at first in my yard.
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all my asian persimmons are leafing out now. i never really noticed it before. very good question. i thought it was just my trees. glad to know it will darken up the dark green. i thought it is related to lack of fertilizer/ hungry for plant food. i havent fertilize my trees yet.
I’ve noticed the same thing. Here is Ichi-Ki-Kei-Jiro in MA, already greener than it was a week ago.
Yeah, I thought it was on account of too high ph, so I added the 21-0-0 nitrogen to acidify the soil. Turns out that wasn’t necessary. Thanks for responding. Makes me feel better to know I have nothing to worry about.
Awesome! Makes me feel much better to know it’s healthy and doing great.
Wow, is there any type of fruit tree you don’t grow? You must have an amazing orchard. By the way, the nectaplum didn’t get any leaf curl. It also has about 50 fruit that are starting to swell. This is the 2nd summer so I’m pretty excited. Nectaplum is my favorite stone fruit and I rarely ever see it for sale anywhere.
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Now that I know it isn’t unhealthy I’m excited by how beautiful it is. The yellow leaves make quite a splash in the garden contrasting nicely against all the various green shades in spring. The tree down the road cranks 100’s of fruit every fall, so that’s why I got the same variety. This variety is really good while firm and crispy as well as when they get soft and gooey. The type I typically find in the store are not good when firm.
I don’t grow a nectaplum but think I might have to!
Glad I stumbled on this post if this is normal. Might as well bump it since I’m sure theres a lot of newer persimmon growers out there. This tree is now 3rd leaf and not sure how old it was from the nursery but the first year I put in from a 15g in a large 28” redwood container it was green and lush. Second year it was yellow and I fed it some bloodmeal it eventually greened up. This year she’s in ground so I won’t feed it besides a little 5-5-5 and a little rock phosphate when planting. I used gypsum in the hole before planting also.
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Maybe a few inches of wood chips for moisture retention could help too!
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Yeah good ideal Ryan thanks. I’ll probably get a bunch of Cedar for a few trees just to spite the ants. They mostly offer redwood, fir and cedar.
Have you tested the soil PH? I don’t want to go against the consensus too much, but I grow Fuyus (possibly Jiros, actually) in both North Georgia and Las Vegas, and your leaves look a bit yellow to me, like possibly from an iron deficiency.
Vegas has alkaline soil and my Fuyu has somewhat lighter leaves than the ones in Georgia, but they are still darker green than yours. Here’s some pics of the Vegas tree from the last two weeks (same bud):
On the other hand, it is normal for the leaves to darken a great deal by summer. Here is a pic of a Saijo persimmon at the same location last year. You can see the difference in coloration between the new leaves and the mature ones:
I mention the possible nutrient deficiency (due to pH) because I am often confronting it in Vegas due to the alkaline soil (it is never an issue with the acidic soil in Georgia). Despite dosing with sulfur, calcium and magnesium, my young Korean Giant pear is not making happy-looking leaves – these are newly opened, but I think they are too yellow:
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Thanks Marten. Yeah it’s around neutral ph I just tested it. Typically most everything here around this part of Ca. is a little higher on the ph especially the water.
I have some Liquinox iron n zinc I sprayed last in the container year maybe I’ll give that a shot again especially since it’s newly planted in ground.
I planted an Asian Pear up front about the same time and I thought it was looking good besides this fruit fly on it. Idk it’s my first Asian Pear tree. I assume the reddish growth is good.
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Yeah, the leaves on your pear look as green as the new leaves on my Georgia pears – much better than my Big Bird Vegas Korean Giant.
Not all of my pears have those reddish new leaves – most are more yellow – but a hybrid, Daisui Li, retains that red coloration in its new growth for quite a while.
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