Don’t feel bad, Bob, I did the same thing on one of my grafts!
Thanks for the awesome and honest info, Bob. You give me hope. I also couldn’t help but chuckle when I noticed that I’m not the only one who is such a cheapskate that I reuse those white tags by marking out the prior name and writing the new one further toward the end. haha.
My experience with persimmons is most of my mistakes are grafting too early. This year I did the first round when there were 1" or so of leaves, but the bark was still not slipping well (it didn’t peel off easily). None of them took. When I re-grafted a month later they all took. I am always going to check for good bark slippage from now on.
Oops- I hadn’t even realized that I was showing off my “efficiency” 
. I’ll give you an example from even further down the cheapness scale. When I run out of tags, I write the name on some of the green garden tape and use that instead. In fact, when taking the tape off late in the summer I needed to scramble to find a more permanent tag. On a few where nothing came to hand, I just retied the tape loosely.
Looking again at the tags in the pics, I should also note that I’ve sometimes had trouble with the writing fading. So, I sometimes write the name twice (on both sides, as one side will probably face the sun more), with 2 different pens (often one lasts longer than the other).
Between your “fiscal conservativeness” (ie "cheapness) and procrastination tendencies (waiting until the end of summer to do permanent tags) I’m confident we’d be fast friends! ha. I’m one of the worlds biggest misers- even with my employers money, much to the frustration of many employees.
Thanks, @scottfsmith, I’ll keep that tip in mind for next spring. I desperately do want to turn my 2 and 3 year old root stocks into viable persimmon trees, so it is important to me that I succeed in grafting all those that had the tops die.
I had pretty good success whip and tongue grafting native on native persimmons when I was first learning to graft, but that was pretty random, and it took me 3-4 years with dozens of attempts per year to get decent success rates with Asian persimmons. For the first few years I didn’t get a single graft to take and survive through until the next year. I wouldn’t exactly say that, in my experience, they’re hard to graft, though. I just think that there are a lot of details to pay attention to with persimmons that aren’t so important with other species. For example, removing competing growth from below the graft multiple times per week is something that seems necessary with persimmons. I wouldn’t call that “hard,” because you certainly don’t need to be an expert grafter to do it, but those kind of extra steps seem to matter more. Something else that I think was a huge issue for me was persimmon psylla (although they don’t seem to be a big issue for other people in other areas, perhaps because they’re in areas where there aren’t so many native persimmons growing already.) I think the psylla just sapped the life out of my grafts before they could really get going. I now put bags of row cover (remay) material around all my persimmon grafts now before they start to grow, and that seems to make a big difference. The bags accommodate at least 6" of new growth, and once they grow that much they seem to be able to outgrow further problems. The bags can catch the wind, though, so they definitely require staking. It all makes for a lot of time per graft, but again, I wouldn’t say any of it is really “hard.” I also think I made mistakes early on grafting too high in the tree and where the stem was too small. If there is any point at which the tree previously branched and where the continuing stem tapers significantly, it seems best to graft below that point. I think with a lot of my failures I tried to find a place on my tree (rootstock) where the diameter came fairly close to the diameter of my scion for a neater fit, but it seems best to graft onto the largest portion of the trunk (and not worry at all about the rootstock being a lot larger), not necessarily at the very bottom, but below any place where the tree previously forked out in 7 directions like persimmons do.
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Eric- Now that’s the kind of detailed info I was looking for. Of course, I’m now going to have to go research what persimmon psylla is, but that was an extremely helpful response. Thank-you.
Psylla is an insect: Trioza diospyri . Eggs are deposited on new growth leaves and it causes them to curl. If you look closely on the underside of the leaf you will see a white like substance with the naked eye. These are generally “farmed” by ants. When I see ants on young persimmons, I spray them with permethrin. You can use Sevin, but Permethrin seems to last longer. If you catch it early, it is not a problem. If you don’t it will set back young persimmons. They don’t seem to like the older growth as much. I generally find them on new growth on young trees. If you get a little leaf curl, you can uncurl and remove the eggs by rubbing between your finger. If the leaf curl is more significant, remove the curled leaves completely and dispose elsewhere. I have had some success in reducing the problem using a bug zapper near the trees to kill adults, but I found watching for ants and using permethrin as soon as I see them is the most effective.
Jack,
Thanks for the infos. I have a total of 12 D.Vs and Kakis but so far have not seen any Psylla. I will have to keep a close eye on them.
Tony
Tony, I don’t believe persimmon psylla have alternate hosts, so if persimmons don’t grow wild in your area, I don’t think there would be any psylla to affect your trees.
In my experience, if persimmon psylla kill a graft they do it before the first leaf ever sizes up and sometimes before the elongated bud even opens up into a leaf at all. I suspect that persimmon psylla prefer Asian persimmons (either that or new Asian persimmon growth is generally less vigorous or less vigorous when grafted onto native rootstock, but I suspect the psylla just like Asian growth better), because I’ve had a decent number of native on native grafts survive without protection but practically no Asians. I think the problem is definitely compounded by the fact that I’m not grafting until after the native persimmons have all leafed out, and then it’s longer yet before my grafts start to grow, so by that time my grafts are about the only fresh new growth around, and that’s what the psylla really seem to like.
We have persimmon psylla out here in the desert with no native persimmon and very few planted persimmon. But usually they come in late and only affect late growth. If they arrived on the initial growth it would be ugly.
To expand on my previous post, here are some pics of my Saijo I grafted this spring. I did 2 grafts onto a seedling virginiana that was about 3’ tall.
My basic technique was: whip and tounge graft, tightly wrap with grafting rubbers, wrap graft union and scion in parafilm, and make a shield from aluminum foil to cover graft union. All other branches were removed at time of grafting and rootstock buds had to be rubbed off frequently (2-3x per week) for a month or two. It has grown about 18" this year with quite a few branches.
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Cousinfloyd,
That could very well be. I did all of my grafting on young persimmons indoors under lights and had no problems with the grafts. My issues occurred after I took the plants outside where I presume they got exposed. I have also had psylla issues with young trees grown from seed for rootstock. They seem to like young succulent growth. New leaves on the plant are most effected. With my trees both American and Oriental were impacted at about the same rate.
You won’t believe this, but I’m pretty confident that I have a psylla problem even though I had no idea what it was until this excellent thread! It’s true, the only 2 complete persimmon trees I have left are Hachiyas and starting about 1/2 way through summer, every single time new growth would come out, the leaves would quickly become all curled up and over time they’d stay that way and just be unhealthy looking. Further down, the established older leaves didn’t seem to be affected. Of course I never knew to look for the white stuff you just described. The final evidence I have to offer is that I’ve definitely seen ants on the new leaves in a higher concentration that on typical trees. And just so you know, there are certainly wild persimmons in my area and one wild persimmon tree about 300 yards away. Based on everything you all have just said, I think I may have learned an extremely helpful lesson here. One more reason I love this site! THanks so much for everyone’s input!
Beautiful graft union!!! That’s my basic W&T technique. It has worked well for me on multiple species.
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I’m echoing @thecityman. I’ve got a a psylla problem on my d. virginiana seedlings, and thanks to this thread especially @cousinfloyd and @forestandfarm I know what it is and how to treat it. Additionally, I’ve learned a bunch of specifics about persimmon grafting, which I hope to do this spring, if my seedlings can put on enough growth while fighting the psylla. Thanks again to the many members of this forum who are willing to share their expertise.
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Don’t feel bad, it took me a couple seasons to figure it out. You are probably not growing them the way I did, but it might offer you some encouragement. Last spring I started persimmons from seed in Rootmaker 18s and then transplanted them to 1 gal rootbuilder II containers in mid-summer. These containers air prune the roots making for a very dense root system. The combination of a late start and the effects of psylla caused many of them to be on the small side for grafting but I gave it a go anyway. I let them go dormant and mulched in the containers to give them the chill hours they needed.
Around Christmas time I brought them indoors and warmed them up and grew them under lights. A few weeks before they produced leaves, I grafted them with Nikita’s Gift scions that Tony graciously provided me. For those close to pencil size in diameter, I used W&T and for the smaller ones I used a wedge type graft. My success rate was far from perfect, but I ended up with quite a few nice trees.
Once I was convinced the grafts took, I transplanted them to 3 gal rootbuilder II containers and kept them on my deck for the summer. By this spring I had learned to catch psylla and treat it before it could cause too much damage. Here is a picture of one that I took on July 11th, so it has grown a bit since then:
I hope to plant them in the field in the next week or so. It goes to show that even when the rootstock is set back by psylla the previous year, you can still get good tree growth after grafting. A few of these trees stalled out in the spring at about a foot, but I’d say most of them are now 4’ to 5’ tall.
Thanks,
Jack
@forestandfarm (Jack) I don’t know what I like more about this site- the incredible wealth of information available or the fact that when people give it to me they never make me feel like the dummy I am for not knowing many of the things I ask about! SO thanks for your kindness and special thanks for the information. Also, I had read a good deal about those air pruning pots so I was also interested in hearing and seeing them. They look really neat in your photo. However, it looks like they are sitting on the ground or porch or something. I thought they had to be up off the ground for the roots to be able to come out??? If so, do you then manually trim those roots that come out or do they just dry out and die/fall off?
Your success with persimmon grafting gives me hope, and just like fruitnut said, the photo that shows your graft is incredible. I’ve often read that the better the graft work, the smaller bulge is created at the union. If that’s true, your graft is near perfect because I see no bulge at all. My own grafts, on the other hand, often result in bumps that approach the size of a golf ball! haha Clearly I have a lot to learn.
I can’t wait to try and graft my 4-5 persimmon rootstocks next spring, and I hope I can find people kind enough to give me some scions (knowing the people here I’m not too worried about that!) . Anyway, thanks again for your great info. I only wish I’d known earlier what was going on with the curled up leaves on my hachiyas so I wouldn’t have wasted the second half of summer the way I did!
There are a number of brands of root pruning containers but the ones I use and am most familiar with are Rootmaker brand. Dr. Whitcomb was one of the pioneers in this area and I learned a lot reading his papers. At retail, Rootmaker is a bit pricier than some of the other brands, but I got a commercial account with Rootmaker and the wholesale prices are competitive.
Different brands and even different containers within a brand work differently. The containers I used for this are 18 Express trays and Rootbuilder II. These all use air pruning verses root trapping or root constriction (other root pruning methods).
The 18s are the first step. They prune the tap root and you are correct, they need good air flow beneath them.
This picture happens to be of young pawpaw trees but it gives you an idea of the 18 express trays. The individual cells can be removed. I like them for starting trees under lights because I can use inexpensive fluorescent lights which are cool and keep the lights close to the trees. I can reorganize the cells at any time to keep trees of the same size together. The tray supports the cells so the cells sit above the surface and there are holes in the side of the tray for air to get in. I further place them on wire racks for more air flow.
When the root tip hits the air, it desiccates and there is no open wound for infection to enter like when you prune roots by hand. Once the tap root is pruned, the tree begins sending out secondary and tertiary roots until the they have filled the 18. I use a professional soilless mix which allows for a lot of space for the roots to fill and is very well drained.
The Rootbuilder II containers work slightly differently. They have protrusions that you can see all around the sides of the container with holes in the end of each protrusion. When lateral roots get near the sides of the container, the protrusion routes them to one of the side holes where they are air pruned. The bottom of these containers is solid. They are concave relative to the outside of the container and convex relative to the inside. They also have ridges that radiate out toward the sides. When roots hit the bottom, they are routed along that convex plastic bottom to one of the lower side holes where the root is again air pruned.
When I unwrap one of these containers and look at the root ball, the bottom looks like a star with roots radiating out from the center. I have seen no circling or j-hooking using these.
By contrast, I have friends who use burlap-style bags for root pruning. The material weave is coarse enough for roots to grow through the bag and get air pruned. The problem with these bags is that if you don’t have good air flow on all sides including the bottom you can have issues. I’ve seen guys leave these on the ground and have the roots grow through the bag right into the soil.
Thanks,
Jack
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