Hi, I have 4 American persimmons - two are fully female (Prok & Morris Burton); the other two are mixed: Szukis (male, producing female flowers) & Early Golden (which I hear produces some male flowers, although I am not certain that its just not parthenocarpic instead of actually really having male flowers with pollen - someone here will likely know). I have no American persimmons growing wild locally. So, the only reliable pollinator for the 3 female trees is the male Szukis. That should ordinarily be fine, except in the case of the Szukis, since I'm not really interested in its fruit, I intend to grow it so that is will grow very tall and thin as it will be planted between two trees. It will have a spread of 10' to itself until it breaks the canopy and towers above the 20-30' tall small trees around it (sweetbay magnolia & shadblow serviceberry). IF this is a bad idea, then I will not transplant the Szukis into this tight spot and I will, instead, leave it in a spot where it has 20' to itself. I just don't want to waste the spot where another fruit tree could grow instead where having limbs closer to the ground is desirable. Thanks, Steve Btw, I am not completely convinced that I need to keep my American persimmons 15' wide x 20' tall for ease of picking. I feel that I should let them grow as tall as they will get (when competing against each other for space and light) and hope that, in such a situation of being planted 15', they don't really spread wider then 20' in less then 5 decades (or else they will drop fruit all over my neighbor's walk-way on the side that is not blocked.) I think that placing suspended mesh nets under the trees during harvest season and pulling on limbs with ropes from the ground to shake loose trees would be good enough for a good harvest for my family and friends (3 trees).

I checked up on it again, and I now think that it is a native american perismmon. I was mistaken on the tree height actaully. It's much taller, but one branch extends out of the woods, and ony that branch bears fruit. This may be why they are larger. Even so, I think I overestimated their size. One of them even seemed to be turning orange. There's a good chance it's an ordinary native tree that's slightyly different because of it's growing conditions. I'll see if I can get photos.

Condensed tannins or previously damaged spots. Ate a few(unusually early) ripe Rosseyanka fruits yesterday. Two had firm black 'eschar' type lesions in their skin that were readily peeled right out. Some selections, like Yates/Juhl have little specks of black, condensed tannins throughout the pulp. I freeze some whole and eat them like a persimmon popsicle, others I pulp out and freeze back for use in persimmon pudding at a later date. You can dry them in a dehydrator or make persimmon fruit leather. Persimmon jelly, persimmon beer...the list goes on. Google up 'persimmon recipes' - you'll find a lot to play around with.

Just need to add a post to this to keep on the first page for a bit in hopes someone out there might respond. I realize this is more of an ecological/botanical question than a gardening, but would love somebody's input...