Your favorite persimmon?

[ediblelandscaping.sc]

@brownmola are you using D. lotus rootstocks?

[murky]

@scottfsmith

For me Chocolate is the pinnacle of persimmon flavor - its intense brown sugar plus persimmon. It is above all others by quite a bit. Coffeecake can be hard to ripen, it needs a long season. I have not been getting many Chocolates for several years as the tree roots have been fading. My Hachiya winter died so now I have Chocolate going on its roots and I hope to be back in the Chocolate business soon! I also have a Maru which is very tasty but the fruits are small. Aizu Michirazu is another I like, similar to Hachiya but smaller. I prefer the soft ones. I grow some firm ones for the rest of my family.

I don’t grow any American or hybrids but I do hear some of the new ones are excellent.

Strange, Raintree claims Coffeecake ripens a month before Fuyu and is a cultivar they recommend for short, cooler summers.

[markalbob]

I’ve found persimmons to graft pretty well, all my grafts so far have been American on American. Probably 80+% take.

As Edible mentioned, you really need to rub off below-graft growth, and you need to graft when the rootstock was already swelling buds or leafing out.

I should edit: I haven’t had “cleanness of cut” issues any worse than apples, although all my cuts are reasonably clean or I keep shaving until they are. And my persimmon work has been chip budding, cleft, whip-and-tongue, and modified bark grafts like on Cliff England’s facebook page. I don’t think persimmon calluses significantly harder, but I do think the rootstock can be stubborn, and if you graft too soon before the rootstock is really woke up and going, the scions crap out before the rootstock ever pushes any juice their way.

[scottfsmith]

Oops I got Coffeecake mixed up with Hyakume, sigh They are both light brown color. My Coffeecake died before it fruited. Will edit the above. I wish they would always use the Japanese names, I forget which English name aligns with which Japanese name. Coffeecake is Nishimura Wase. Brown Sugar is Hyakume.

[Chills]

I had no luck with pawpaws grafting but 2 of 4 of my persimmons took with rind grafts. Once the strongest took ( which took about 2 months) it’s grown like gangbusters…3 feet in just about a month.

My first success grafting, btw

Scott

[hambone]

@Chills- Are you saying your persimmon graft took two months to take, show growth? If yes, that’s about twice as long as my apple grafts. Wow. Good to know. BTW I’m zero for lifetime in persimmon graft attempts but have collected great tips from people on this site and believe as a result I’ll get some persimmon takes next spring. Apple grafting seems to be a “gateway drug.”

[Chills]

I grafted May 28th. Growth started the end of July.

Rind graft, wrapped with paraffin and painted with sealing tar. Then tightly held together with a rubber band. There were lots of sprouts from below, I had to check it at least twice a week to keep them from stealing the energy.

For full disclosure, it was Nikita’s Gift being grafted on American persimmon roots. The original stick was thinner than a golf pencil and now the point of graft is nearly dime thickness.

There are pictures of it all along the way in another thread.

Scott

[trev3411]

If you’re in southern CA, come to the persimmon tasting at SCREC in Irvine, CA on Nov 10, 2016 @ 10am:
http://screc.ucanr.edu/?calitem=315681&g=68933
You’ll get to taste many of the varieties mentioned in this video:

Irvine Persimmon Collection

[jujubemulberry]

@Chills

My first success grafting

that sealed the deal- as the first success is the mother of all mastery!

[ediblelandscaping.sc]

@trev3411 I sure wish I could make it. Every time I watch this video it makes me want to visit.

[jujubemulberry]

same here… Can’t wait for the first crates of 'simmons to be delivered from cali!

[JohnS]

My favorite is Garretson. I grow Early Golden and I like that one too. I like American persimmons better than the Asian ones because their flavor is more subtle and complex. I used to have Izu at my other house. It was good, but not nearly as interesting as an American persimmon in my humble opinion.
John S
PDX OR

[coolmantoole]

I just planted my first two persimmons. One is a Fuju and the other is Giombo. I got these because these are the two the nursery happened to have. Does anyone have any first hand experience with Giombo? God bless.

Marcus

[aap]

Giombo’s are top 3 but it is not precocious. A keeper for sure. It is a vigorous tree for a asian, prune it short and wide.

[coolmantoole]

Thanks, that’s helpful to know. God bless.

Marcus

[ross]

Is Hyakume astringent, Scott? Any idea on it’s hardiness too?

[scottfsmith]

Hyakume is PVNA - not astringent if pollinated. You don’t want to grow it without a pollinator, they taste no good. It was always hardy for me, it can take down to the low single digits with no problems.

There are several varieties of Hyakume, that word is a type not a variety. It is similar for Maru and Fuyu, there are many versions. I grew a couple of them and they were a bit too long a season and not all that flavorful so I pulled them.

[ross]

Any idea what varieties pollinate these? Perhaps I should look into Coffeecake.

I’m growing:

Miss Kim
Nikita’s Gift
Rosseyanka
Prok
Barbra’s Blush
Celebrity
Jiro Fuyu
Izu
Cinebuli
Ichi Ki Kei Jiro

[strudeldog]

Ross,

I don’t think any of those you just listed are PV types. I doubt the flavor would improve much if any on those, You would have to deal with seeds on many if pollinated at least on the Kaki. The Virginiana pollination is a different deal however many need pollination but really more a matter of holding fruit not as much a taste thing

[coolmantoole]

I might have space to add one more persimmon, I’m thinking of adding chockolate. Would Fuyo or Giombo polenize it? If not, what would I need to graft into it to act as a pollen source. I absolutely have space for only one more tree in my yard. The only way to add more percimmon varieties will be to graft other varieties into the three that I will eventually have. God bless.

Marcus