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You must have seen old black piano keys. Did you ever know that these black piano keys are made up of persimmon tree wood?

Persimmon or the Deispyros Kaki is the tree that gives us an extraordinarily hard black wood. It is one of the most attractive and decorative tree. The semi-weeping habit and its foliages make it one of favourite choices of florists while arranging flowers. During the autumn foliages of the persimmon, change and you can see a lovely combination of red, yellow, and orange colours.

Japanese love persimmons growing in their gardens. In Japan, the tree is more popular with the name “Oriental Kaki”. History of growing this lovely plant dates back to even the 8^th century. In this sense persimmon is an ancient plant as well.

Persimmon tree is a typical deciduous variety and the normal height gained by a tree is around seven meters. You would certainly love its fruits. You will find a rough, leathery calyx at the stem end. Persimmon fruits are almost similar in size and shape to the apples. In the beginning, colour of its fruits is yellow and slowly with ripening, it keeps on turning orange and even tangerine red. Starting from the month of April up to the middle of the June it is ripening time for persimmon fruits.

The ‘non-astringent’ variety of the persimmon fruits becomes ready to eat as soon as it colours up. The ‘astringent’ variety on the other hand requires a long wait until fruits get soft from inside and squishy in the flesh.

While selecting the most suitable variety of persimmons for your garden you need to decide if you like the astringent or the non-astringent variety. There are large numbers of varieties available in the garden stores now days. Fuyu is one of the beautiful and crispy varieties of non-astringent types. Jiro is another such variety and both of these produce good and tasty fruits.

Nightingale and Dai Dai Maru are two extremely popular astringent varieties of the persimmon. Fruits of these varieties will give you a typical deciduous flavour. You will have to wait until the fruits become really soft and juicy as you find with apricot jam texture.

If you are planning for persimmon trees in your garden, you must ensure that the place is open and quite sunny for the most part of the day. You should also maintain a normal distance of around 3-4 meters between two successive trees in a row. Enough space is must for the tree to spread around with branches.

When buying tree you need to be a little careful as well. Avoid the open-rooted or bare-rooted trees, as the roots of this plant are highly susceptible to various types of diseases. Better, buy them in a bag or pot.

Good drainage is extremely essential otherwise; Cinnamon Fungus or Phytophthora Rot could affect plants.

When pruning the plant just take almost 30 cm from the top. Tree will branch out as a fully-grown and healthy this way. While planting the persimmons you may also choose a sheltered place that is not affected by wind. Saving the tree from wind blows is essential as the wood is brittle in nature and it can split up in heavy winds.

While harvesting the persimmon trees ensure removing fruits first. Simply pulling the fruits could damage them. Ripening the fruits in right way is also important. Put them in a bowl with a ripe banana or apple. It will add ethylene in a natural way to the fruits and will help the persimmon fruits ripe more quickly.