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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] Yates persimmon photos

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  • From: Elizabeth Hilborn <ehilborn@mebtel.net>
  • To: William McNam <billmcnam@yahoo.com>, North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Yates persimmon photos
  • Date: Tue, 15 Nov 2011 19:28:49 -0500

William,

I can't fully test your' heat and brown coloration' hypothesis, but I can offer my experience.

I planted a Yates that I ordered from Stark Bros. about 4 years ago. It bore fruit for the first time this year. I concur on their excellent falvor, size and early ripening. I expected (based on Jerry's previous comments) but did not see significant brown discoloration in my fruit. I may have missed insignificant specs of color. They looked pretty uniformly orange to me. It has been an unusually hot summer here in central NC, within the top 5 hottest years on record I believe.

Betsy Hilborn
7a Central NC

I have often heard that the Yates fruit has dark specs (precipitated tannin?) embedded in the flesh. For example ,here is a comment from Jerry Lehman: "Juhl (Yates) is among the earliest. It is large & sweet. I highly recommend it. Only problem is the flesh is loaded with precipitated tannins (black material) and isn't pleasant to look at. Looks dirty!!! Otherwise a great early persimmon. It is the seed parent of H-118 which has much less black material." I hadn't noticed this before. Upon closer observation one very hot year, I did notice some insignificant brown specs in the flesh. But they were not conspicuous ,and did not affect the taste. These close-ups of cut fruit from the 2011 season show no dark "inclusions" (brown specs) in the flesh of Yates fruit This has been a cooler-than-usual summer ,with heat unit accumulations below normal. This year is the latest this fruit has ever ripened for me. I have formulated a hypothesis: the brown specs occur more in years of "high heat unit accumulations" and in regions with hotter summers than mine. Perhaps the grape growers on list can confirm a similar phenomenon with wine grapes: Is there a correlation between hot summers and high tannin concentrations in grapes? Of course there could be other cultural explanations. P.S.I got my graftwood of Yates directly from Ed Yates.






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