Who plants chestnut and persimmon trees for wildlife? Is it worth it? Are they slow to produce???

Jerry looked in to planting some persimmons. It takes 10 years foe them to bear fruit.
I think chestnuts are 4 or 5 maybe.

Apples they said were a good choice.

Check with your local ascs office. Here they sometimes have certain varieties they supply if your planting for wildlife.

Persimmon trees are the bomb. I have not planted any. I also like nut trees too .

I have done permsimmons. They are slow, but the deer love them.
Best luck I have had is with wild plum. We have 3 year old tree's already producing fruit.
And the deer go crazy for them.

I planted persimmon about 5 years ago. Trees are doing great but no fruit yet.

Fact, more wildlife depend upon Oak trees than any other.

I have never seen a transplanted (from the wild) persimmon tree bear fruit.

Yeah but oaks take 50 yrs to produce acorns.

Jerry brother got some kind of supposedly fast growing oaks that were supposed to produce in like 10 yrs. Its been 15 or more and still no acorns.

Had saw tooth oaks produce relatively fast.

Started persimmons from seeds last 3 years.
Keep.seeds in fridge over winter.

Seeds take months to germinate.

Recently read better to plant seeds in fall.

If you want persimmon seeds to germinate source them from dung that has set all winter

Planted about 5 lbs of chestnuts for 10 years or so planted in fall tried spring deep and shallow started seedlings Nothing Seems like deer and everthing else likes to dig them out and eat them seedlings too tubes don't stop mice and other small rodents
My suggestion would be to start and transplant seedlings at a couple years old with protection and around other trees so they don't stand out like a beacon for deer

Persimmons have separate male and female trees. Males never produce fruit.

Persimmon grow wild around here. If you let them, they will take over your pasture. I can't imagine planting one.


I tried planting chestnut one time. When they got old enough to start producing I found out they weren't chestnuts at all but sawtooth oaks. Everything else I bought from that company died. I figure they knew everything would die and I would never know they sent me the wrong thing.


You know those invasive ornamental pears that everyone hates? We've got those around here but this year I tried grafting some bartlett cuttings to one of them. It will be awhile before I know if it worked. I always have trouble getting fruit trees to live so if this grafting thing works I should be able to grow a ton of pears.

Mine do, as well as the Paw Paw's

What if the male trees identify as a female tree? Will they produce fruit then?

Yes Phil, in woketopia anything is possible.

Is a good way to pass the winter. Chestnuts grow pretty fast. As stated, don’t plant the tree; tube or no tube, until you can ring the nut off the seedling. They will get torn up. Best to keep the seedlings in pots for two years before planting. Get a tall pot when initially planting. Collect nuts in fall, put in bag in fridge in peat moss, once the start shooting a tap root in late winter put them in a pot and cover with two inches with mix shown above. Works great

Very nice! Planted 30 chestnuts last weekend along with 25 butternuts at the cabin that makes 390 fruit and nut trees planted in the last 5 years. Planted a mix of 75 pines 15 years ago, a porkey found them this year and cleaned three pretty good. All our trees were seedlings but we didn't start them. Should be a nice place for the critters in 20 years.

LOL.LOL.

If you want persimmons to produce fruit faster graft on some buds from a good producer. I planted some seedling American persimmons years ago and then grafted on some selected american varieties. Meador was one if memory serves. The grafted part of the tree produces regular crops.

In general anything that is grafted will start to bear fruit (or nuts) much sooner than a seedling will.

I have planted persimmons. One thing to keep in mind is that I believe it is if 10 are planted only one will be a female and that is pretty much my experience. I have planted chestnut seedlings and nuts but all are under 3 years old. I put a metal cage around the nut.

If you graft from a female persimmon to a male will the grafts still produce fruit?

I planted some Japanese variety persimmons tree more than a dozen years ago now .They started to produce in about 6 -8 years .Now the trees are about 25 feet tall .The deer absolutely love them Also have fox /coyote and other wildlife feeding on them in Jan/Feb .The ones I planted hold their fruit into mid winter so the deer keep coming back as they drop fruit in the middle of cold weather. And if you are willing to pick them up you can use them in the kitchen as a preservatives A friend has had good luck with a variety of chestnut trees .His produced quickly and bear a large amount of nuts He has bear deer and turkey feeding on them every winter

All mine have.

Home office for American Chestnut Society is in Asheville, NC. Their website has lots of good info. They will talk by phone also. Helpful people dedicated to the return of chestnut trees. Google them.

No need to plant persimmons around here. They’re everywhere along the field edges and ditch banks. Some are far more productive than others.

Chestnuts and persimmon are my favorite for wildlife. These were planted in mid March. Took the picture last weekend.

Yes. From the union of the graft on out it is female.

The four trees to the left in the picture were planted in 2006. All 4 are female persimmons. I dug a dozen root shoots up from the 4 trees and I think they will all be female too. I planted 200 persimmon trees in 2006 that I got from the NWTF - and I would say 80% survived and at least 50% are females. I’ve planted Chinese and Dunstan chestnuts. To answer your questions…..persimmons and chestnuts normally take 5 to 7 years to produce fruit or nuts after planting 1 to 2 year old seedlings. I fertilize mine in the spring and I think they grow fairly fast. It is worth it to me when I see the wildlife eating the nuts or fruit.

I hear you Turkey, good job!

I have planted american chestnuts, but more to just keep them going.

Good for the deer too

just planted some chestnut before i came to florida swamp chestnut about 4 feet tall ,i have to fence everything thing that I plant or the deer will eat , have 100 swamp oak coming when I get home

I may plant persimmon after talking to a DNR forester last week. He said there's at least 1 kind that seems to do well in Wi, & that deer love 'em: Nikita’s Gift.

AJE

Maybe someone will start a self help organization to provide any trees that are confused about this type of problem with advice

As others have stated our persimmons will take over if you don’t watch it. Unfortunately, The males don’t produce. I planted Chinese chestnuts 25 years ago from seedlings and they produce a ton of mast. However, don’t plant them in areas you want to work dogs, have kids play, or walk because the husk that holds the nuts are solid needle bombs and will ruin your day and flatten small equipment tires. I believe the chestnuts started to produce in about 6-7 years. My sawtooth oaks started in 7 years. I planted some pears and apples also. Found that the “old time” stuff did much better than the fancy hybrid trees that are designed to mature at different times. They produced but the fruit would never release from the tree….rotted on the limbs.

Interesting I have not heard of this issue

Much of the issue with planting fruit trees is what rootstock they are on. The overall performance of the tree is tightly tied to which rootstock it has. A lot of the supermarket hybrid trees may be on roots that don't stand up to your conditions.

Chestnuts are that sharp?

Yes, once the husk matures and browns up it becomes brittle and it’s a real nuisance. Won’t puncture tractor tires but will on worn lawnmower tires etc. Tough on feet and paws. However, deer live them.

Just took this pic this morning at one of my deer plots. I planted this persimmon about 12 years ago as a 4ft bare root sapling. It's about 20 feet tall now. Bought thru the Ga Forestry Commission tree program. Have others doing just as good. As stated above, only female persimmons make fruit. You can tell the sex of tree in May by the flower.



I have several sawtooth oaks that are more than 15 years old....not a single acorn. Thinking about cutting them down. But, I have seen sawtooths (younger than mine) on other properties that make so many acorns its almost unbelievable. Don't know why mine do not.

I’ve seen the same thing with Sawtooths. I know of a small grove of beautiful Sawtooths planted on another property that don’t produce.
We have three planted on one part of the property that produce year after year. Got a camera on them now.
We have a couple marking a memorial that I need to recheck, but don’t think they’ve ever produced.
Another tree that drops nuts, that deer, turkeys, and hogs will eat, is pecans. We have a few scattered on the property and they always attract wildlife.

I have learned that sawtooths DON'T like any shade and they prefer darker soils. Thought this was part of my problem, but I have several planted in full sunlight and riverbottom black soil......no acorns ever and 40 ft tall. Only good for shade....

There are some at the dove field on Chickasawhatchee that are the biggest I’ve ever seen. They produce, or used to.

Definitely plant Persimmon, but in my opinion you should try to get seeds from a wild persimmon and like others have said plant a bunch. It's likely they already exist close by to you, but they are worth it once you can get them to Swamp Wolf size. The other thing I would do is plant PawPaw trees, they are also huge deer bringers. Swamp Wolf, there is a "Mango" variety of PawPaw that came out of Georgia in the 70s, not impossible to find now, but they do great as well.

One way also if you know that a particular Persimmon tree has fruited is if it's big enough it will make suckers you can take cuttings of to transplant. Around here in LA we have a bunch of asian Persimmon, and wild Persimmon, the asian ones get huge and depending on variety can be eaten when they are hard with no bitter taste.

Another awesome crop for Louisiana is the Japanese Satsuma that was brought here a long long time ago, still makes such great oranges and is a huge part of Louisiana farmers markets.

I guess I'll have to watch for this with my atv & mower.

My new acorn planter (I bought the larger of the 2 models) will supposedly plant chestnuts. Now I want to get my hands on some chinese chestnuts.

Come on over to my house and you can look at 5 of them. 1 from a dug up root sprout, and the rest from seed.

I have wild persimmons growing all over my farm. They are loaded this year. Tried to make wine from them around 10 years ago. It was terrible.

I bet the deer like them though

My wife had pa pa seeds soaking waiting to go into the fridge now. I know where a lot of chestnut is to get some for seed. Our persimmons are loaded to the point I'm surprised the limbs are not breaking. I should grab some of those to try also.

I would like to plant some white oaks in placet there is some sun. But don't think I will start from seed.

I would like to plant some basswood and wild plum. For bees in the future we have a lot ot tulip popular sprouts in one of my fields . I May dig some up and relocat them before I bush hog.

Maybe next year I'll plant some chestnut seeds, if I can get my hands on some

My 5 persimmon trees arrive tomorrow. I've never planted them before. I'm disappointed with the supplier though because they shipped them USPS on the 4th and I still haven't gotten them, so I'm leery about what to expect out of survival for these (the shipment contains 4 chinese chestnut too).

Update: All 5 persimmon trees are doing fantastic.

I planted 25 Dustin chestnut trees and 5 Chinese chestnut trees 5 years ago. The Dustin chestnuts are loaded every year the Chinese have yet to produce a single nut.

Not accurate, I have several species of Oaks, Hickory's, and Pecans that started producing at around 10 yrs, and my persimmons haven't fruited yet, but they're in a deep woods setting. You can get a mixed nut selection around C-mas at any grocery store, and get good results, or order seedlings from Mo Conservation Dept nursery in Licking Mo.

I've been planting a lot of acorns but I have yet to to find a source of chestnuts.

Moi

I have a peach tree that grew from a rootstock, that is very similar to the wild Prunus persica, that all the domestic peach trees came out of. It is starting to drop peaches now and will probably drop fruit for another month or more. It has so far had lots of peaches every year since maturity. It has not had off years like my other peaches do. The peaches don't taste bad, but have a lower sugar content. The tree has grown large and this year has several thousand small peaches. The seeds readily sprout and grow quickly.

I bet peach trees like it would be good for wildlife too, especially because the crop develops and drops over a long period of time.

I'm going to grow out a bunch of seedlings from it to graft onto.

Keith

I have 19 like this on one property and 89 I grew from seeds on another property.

Same here. Dustin's are loaded Chinese not a single nut. All are the same age and size.

I've planted some of each & aren't having luck with either. They leaf out at the bottom each year & that's about it. I'm glad you are getting chestnuts.

i bought some chestnut trees last year, they about 4 foot high, only one made it through the winter. other started over from the roots this year, will see what happens.

Sawtooth oak is a very earlier producer.

AJE, put some 10-10-10 around the drip line of the trees. Makes them build strong roots over the winter and should really take off next year.

I recommend the book "Tree Crops" by J. Russel Smith. It's out of print but you may find it on-line. The book is a gem for those thinking of food plots.

I have a container of root stimular but haven't used it in ages. I wonder if this is similar

10-10-10 is a fertilizer that contains 10% nitrogen, 10% phosphate and 10% potash. Root stimulator has a hormone in it, called auxin, that stimulates root growth. Root stimulator sometimes has fertilizer in it too. It should say on the packaging.

Keith

Thanks Keith.

How is everyone's crop doing this fall?

Good luck, & enjoy your harvest.