North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Matt Demmon <mdemmon@gmail.com>]

Quite a few years ago, before I knew much about climate zones and
fruit, but had an eye for unusual plants, I saw 2 very large oriental
persimmons growing in Bloomington, IL. Now, that seems a little too
far north, but at that time I was just amazed to see such a strange
looking tree! The fruit was all 2 1/2 to 3 inches across, and held
vertically upright, bright orange. I don't suppose it could have been
anything else? I'm certain it wasn't an american persimmon. I live in
Michigan now, and I'm not sure what zone Bloomington is, but it must
be 5 or 6.

-matt, se mi z5

On 10/21/09, Jwlehman@aol.com <Jwlehman@aol.com> wrote:
> In a message dated 10/20/2009 8:24:36 PM Central Daylight Time,
> bassem@gardener.com writes:
>
>> Have anyone attempted to grow Asian Persimmon seedlings in colder parts
>> of the US?
>> I know of one variety called "Eureka" that is a seedling from an Asian
>> persimmon grown in the US, but haven't heard of many seedlings setting
>> fruit.
>
> Hello Bass,
>
> About 10 years ago I collected about 250 seeds from the UC Davis Wolfskill
> orchard, seeds of Jiro and Saijo. I planted them here in central Indiana,
> old 5b. nearly all came up.  Almost every winter they froze to the ground
> and
> every spring most came back up with some mortality every year.  Maybe two
> years not all were frozen back. The last ones died about 3 years ago.  My
> experience agrees with what Drs. Payne and Reighard wrote in a paper on KSD
> that
> winter damage begins to accrue at 10 F.
>
> Additionally my experience is serve damage at 0 degrees and -10 F is
> mortal.  I had hoped to find a kaki variety with good frost resistance, but
> nope!
>
> Jerry
>


-- 
-matt demmon