From what I know of persimmons, 1x per week of watering is not enough this time of year. They like a lot of water early in the spring to start growth. Also, first year on Asian fruit trees I've had some really late start of growth. My tamarind didn't start budding until May last year after going in the ground the previous November and losing all it's leaves in January. Once it started, growth was explosive. The tree nearly doubled in height and width last year and didn't experience any leaf drop this winter. It's just now starting to bud this year. Best of luck.

Thanks kojac_phx. I'll increase my watering for both my persimmon and Asian pear. Neither has buds yet, so hope springs eternal!

If you want to know if the trees are still alive, use your fingernail and lightly scratch off a bit of the bark. If you see green, they are still alive. If you see brown, they are dead and will not bud (hope you kept your receipt).

Both my Asian Pear & Fuyu Persimmon are still green when I scratch greenthumbjeff, just not budding. I have increased the water to 2x a week and am optimistic they'll be abundant! :-) I had about 6 small pears from last year, but the persimmon is it's first year in the ground. I'll keep everyone posted.

They're alive! That's good news :)

The budding problem is most likely a chilling hour issue. That means the trees aren't getting enough cold time during the winter. The Fuyu persimmon only needs 100-200 hours, so that should not be a problem in Arizona. Although I do wonder where the tree originated from and when it was dug up and potted.

Asian pears tend to have higher chilling hour requirements and also tend to bud later in the spring. Do you know which variety you have?

greenthumbjeff,

I'm happy to report I was out this evening checking the variety of Asian Pear, which is Chojuro, and found 3 small leaf clusters! I'm very happy. Nothing to report on the persimmon yet and I checked this afternoon, but if the pear is doing what it's supposed to, then the persimmon should too, right? LOL.

Jeff,

update on trees: Fuyu, still nothing. It seems some of the smaller limbs are brittle, the main "trunk" is still green and flexible. However, I'm afraid it's on the way down. :-(

The Asian Pear still has the same 3 small clusters, but it appears healthy. Like I said before, hope springs eternal!

These updates are fun to read. Good luck with both trees, keep us posted.

Take care,
Grant

Glad you're enjoying them Grant. Unfortunately, it appears the Fuyu persimmon is not making it. I'm very sad as this is my second attempt to grow a Fuyu persimmon. But I refuse to give up!

I am sorry to hear about your Fuyu. I had the same issue going on. Everything started budding and growing leaves EXCEPT my fuyu. I finally pulled it this weekend and discovered that there was a tiny green shoot under the roots, but overall the entire plant had died. The roots didn't take and well, I took her out of the ground. I went to a local nursery here in Tucson and bought one that wasn't a bareroot but ready to plant in the ground. This one is doing well, but I have been watering it every 3 days or so.

Rohrerbot- Neither of my two attempts have been bareroot, so I'm not sure what is going on. I've been watering it still, but nothing is happening. I wish you the best with yours!

Soth side of house is gonna put too much sun on persimmon. Need morning sun only first few years. Put up a shade cloth. Water once a week on a drip, approx 4-5 gallons for that size tree

Update on my Fuyu persimmon: it has been laid to rest! I am not giving up however. I have placed an order with Baker's for 1 Fuyu & 1 Giant Fuyu (bareroot). Should be in in January. Any suggestions? I will be more attentive to watering them which I think was the problem. My Asian pear made it through the summer but did not produce any fruit due to not enough H2O.

I am so glad that you posted this. One of the trees that I want to try is a persimmon. I am thinking a Fuyu or a Izu. Every bit of info helps. I have a spot on the North side of an Ironwood tree where I can protect it from the hot Summer sun and yet it will still be able to get some sun, so hopefully this will be a happy place for a Persimmon.

I also bought an Asian pear this past Spring. It is a dwarf that has 4 Asian pear types grafted to it. I have it on the East side of my house and on a watering system where it was watered 3X a week at around 8 to 10 gph for 40 minutes each time this past summer. It came through the hot weather very healthy and even had about a dozen pears on it except the birds have gotten most of them (so I just bought some bird netting.)

I'm chiming in too late, but this happened to me with my Fuyu. After literally months, I complained to the nursery who sold me the tree, and they gave me a new one. I went out to pull out the old and plant the new--and the old one was budding. I felt like an idiot returning the new one, mumbling I guess it wasn't dead after all.

Well, good news (I think) my Asian Pear is full of leaves, but absolutely NO blossoms. I don't think anything is happening this year.

I did get my Baker's order. Received only a Giant Fuyu. I've been more attentive to it, but was still scared because nothing has been happening. Welllll, yesterday I noticed it's about to bud! I feel like such a proud parent now.

I'll take a picture later and post.

I had gotten a bare root Izu Persimmon this Spring and have been going through the same thing. It was still green on the trunk so I was being patient. Finally, Friday, I noticed that the leaf buds were starting to turn green. Now, they are ready to leaf out.
Mine is planted on the North side of an Ironwood tree.

Now, my only bare root tree that has not leafed out is a Sherwood Jujube. The trunk is still green so I have my fingers crossed.

Good luck with your persimmons.

Thanks Agility Mom! Mine is/will be in full sun so I'll need to take measures to protect it this summer. I just don't know what to think of my Asian Pear tree. I'll keep trying.

An update on the Fuyu Persimmon saga. The old tree died. :-( However, I did get a replacement a year ago from Baker Nursery. It seems very happy & healthy. Here are a couple of pictures.

March 2012
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November 2011
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Your persimmon looks great.I am wondering how long shoots it has now, but it is okay, becaue you are in zone 9 :-) my persimmons are still dormant, in zone 6b.

Well, I am so happy. I just noticed this week the Giant Fuyu has blossoms! I wasn't sure what they were at first so I looked up persimmon blossoms on the Internet and lo and behold, they look like what I have! The tree is now 2 years old and almost 6' high at the tallest branch. As usual I don't have a photo as I don't know where my hubby put the camera. :-) But I will post in the next few days.

Great news, AZpamperedchef! We'll want updates all the time, and pics when possible. Fun stuff! Hope you get tons of fruit! Keep us posted! Happy gardening!

Finally found the camera! I was able to put the photos side by side so everyone could see how much the tree has grown! I will next post a photo of the fruit

This is the fruit, first year fruiting! I have lost about half of the fruit. I guess the tree is self-pruning. You can see one of the dried leaves without the fruit next to the viable one.

Does anyone have any idea what the black spots are at the end of the leaf? They get that every year and the leaves don't typically get wet. They're wet in the photo because I gave my trees a washing, they were so dusty!

I put a fuyu persimmon in the ground last February I got it at tropicamango this thing was full or fruit I had about 30. I was excited to see a tree like this with so much fruit. Well my excitement started fading away in may when all the fruit dropped off. Then June most of the leaves had fallen off. The the July monsoon came in and finished off my leaves. I emailed tropica mango to ask if the tree was a done for and if I should rip it up. The owner said just keep it in the ground they don't have new growth in the mid summer due to heat. Well I'm happy to report that I have 10 leaf buds growing so it looks like it may make it. I think it went into shock with transplanting. I was able to sample the fruit at aj's fin foods and am very excited to try it out.

Brisly76,

As you can tell, I had dreadful experiences with my initial persimmons, however this time around it is doing great!

I don't know if this is a typical characteristic of persimmons or not, but my have been putting out new leaves all summer. I thought with the heat and all, they would just "rest" and grow the persimmons (I have about 10 left on the tree), but I guess not!

Terrific updates, all, and I love the side-by-side pic, chef, thanks for posting all of these great updates. You all are giving me a craving to try one myself, lol. Keep us posted! Happy gardening and (hopefully!) happy eating! :)

In October, I yanked a Coffeecake persimmon out of the ground after 8 months and no bud break only to find an extensive and beautiful root system. I quickly did some trimming and put it in a pot and put another Coffeecake bareroot I just bought and I had ready in its place. The new one actually broke dormancy and did rather well within a few weeks. I went inside to find out WTF! And a Google search turned up that persimmons need a certain number of HEAT hours to break dormancy.

I'm guessing wherever the first persimmon was from did not get sufficient heat hours (but its replacement did) before it just gets too hot here to grow, because the original sprouted leaves and branched out nicely a few weeks after transplant to the pot.

Here is a link that might be useful: persimmons and heat units

I'm starting to think that I lost all fruit and leaves because I had put some citrus fertilizer on the tree when I planted it. So the shock of transplanting and then fertilizer that burned the leaves must had done it. I put the same stuff on my banana and jack fruit last week it killed them in a day I learned my lesson. Here is a pic of my covered persimmon.

az_pamperedchef- I just wanted to say thank-you for your long-going posts about your fuyu efforts! I wish more people would do such long term follow-ups. Its so much fun to read (and even better to SEE) about on-going plant experiences. I'm about to plant some FUYU's and have been inspired by your posts. That being said.....TIME FOR ANOTHER UPDATE! :) Did you end up with ripe fruit? Inquiring minds want to know (and see!)

Az PC, Don't forget these persimmons as well as fig trees are deciduous. I used to grow the rounded non-astringent kind in phoenix years ago. Since we never get the really cold snap, the leaves will tend to "die" off slowly. You will notice the slow burned and curled edges on the leaves before they fall off.

I should add, persimmons (like frankly most young trees) should be in a 4 foot radius grass free zone. Grass retards growth.

Western shade should be erected in the summer for the first year in ground (1st leaf). The leaves are more resistant to sunburn their second leaf.

My Suruga persimmon, 2nd leaf, put on 1 fruit (that I had not noticed or I would have pulled it off). Still waiting for final leaves to fall off or birds start to prey upon it before picking. Others (Izu, Fuyu) did not bear fruit 2nd leaf.

Hi, can you post an update on your persimmon tree please?