North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Anton Callaway <marillen@earthlink.net>]

Scott,

My 'Chocolate' persimmon bore extremely heavily for several years.  Because 
it was producing more than we could eat and give away and the tree was 
getting rather large, I pruned it heavily two years ago.  When it leafed out 
following this heavy pruning, it flowered very late (about 6 weeks later than 
usual) and though it flowered even more prolifically than usual, it produced 
only male blossoms.  Last winter, I pruned it moderately and it was only 
about a week late, with about 5% female blossoms.  I believe every one of the 
female blossoms set, so it still will make a good crop.

I don't know how common this is or whether there is any cause-and-effect to 
the pruning & blossoming, but I've found it interesting.

Best regards,

Anton


-----Original Message-----
>From: Scott Smith <scott@cs.jhu.edu>
>Sent: May 30, 2012 9:40 AM
>To: nafex mailing list at ibiblio <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
>Subject: Re: [nafex] Getting a Chocolate kaki to make more female flowers
>
>Jerry, I did put some compost, fertilizer, and bark mulch on the tree this 
>spring (and every previous spring) so I the soil should be good.  The flower 
>types do seem to cluster by branchlet.  I wonder if older branches are more 
>likely to turn to male flowers and I need to let the tree send up some new 
>shoots which will start female?  When the flowering is done this year I will 
>give parts of the tree with no fruits a strong pruning and see what that 
>does for next year.
>
>Scott
>
>On May 30, 2012, at 7:03 AM, Jwlehman@aol.com wrote:
>
>> In a message dated 5/29/2012 8:38:40 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
>> scott@cs.jhu.edu writes:
>> 
>>> My Chocolate persimmon has been making almost exclusively male flowers 
>>> for the last couple of years.  It used to be more balanced male/female 
>>> and I 
>>> would get a tree load of fruit.  Is there something I should do to change 
>>> the balance?  I haven't pruned it much at all so I would not be surprised 
>>> if 
>>> that had something to do with it.
>>> 
>>> Scott
>>> 
>> 
>> Good Morning Scott,
>> 
>> Interesting, very interesting. I have never head this complaint before. 
>> I've heard of persimmon trees effectively switching sexual expression, 
>> your is 
>> the first  first hand account. 
>> 
>> I know of only one D. virginiana cultivar that bears both pistillate and 
>> staminate flowers, Szukis. It is unstable and switches sexual expression 
>> when 
>> grafting. 
>> 
>> Question, were the pistillate and staminate flowers intermixed on the same 
>> branchlets? Or were some branches male and some branches female? If the 
>> later is the case would pruning out the branches that are bearing the 
>> staminate 
>> flowers bring the tree into balance?  I doubt if just pruning limbs 
>> randomly 
>> would bring back the female flowers. 
>> 
>>> From what you wrote the tree has been there quite a few years. What about 
>> soil nutrition?  Has the tree depleted the soil of what it needs?  Then 
>> what 
>> to feed it? Do you have a good supply of compost? Enough for maybe in inch 
>> ground coverage under the tree and beyond the drop line. Or some low 
>> nitrogen 
>> fertilizer, something like 0-20-20.  
>> 
>> I admit I'm just guessing.
>> 
>> Jerry
>> 
>> 
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