The American Persimmon

Tiny fruits, tremendous potential

Deep into the winter’s chill, orange-reddish fruits hang from trees from the Great Plains to the Atlantic Coast of North America. These strange fruits are known as persimmon, and the American persimmon (Diospyros virginiana) has called North America home since the Pleistocene era, stretching as far north as Connecticut and Long Island.¹ In fact, these unique true berries are often listed as anachronistic plants, similar to others we’ve covered (including Kentucky Coffee Tree, Honey Locust, and Pawpaw), despite the fact we wouldn’t traditionally consider them not belonging to modern ecosystems.²

Although it’s unknown if there was a now-extinct megafaunal seed disperser for the American Persimmon, today, it is too large to be consumed by typical North American dispersers, such as birds. One candidate for dispersal may be the coyote, which consumes persimmon in large quantities.³ Evidence on the coyote is conflicting, and the chances of a carnivore co-evolving with the fruit are unlikely, suggesting that something similar to the Mastadons responsible for the other North American fruits was likely a primary consumer of the American persimmon.

During the Ice Age, the fruit was driven south as far as the Potomac River but has since returned as far north as southern Connecticut (in wild populations), although it will likely continue to march north as climate change continues (and given its capacity to handle cooler climates, as we discussed with Buzz Ferver). Once the megafauna of North America were extinct, these trees have learned to adapt to their new environments and have found a new species to support their regeneration— humans.

The earliest archaeological evidence of persimmon points to consumption at least 3500 years ago around the Mississippian culture— a collection of Indigenous societies that have been considered the most complex pre-Columbian community to exist (we’ve discussed the Adena, but land stewardship by the Mississippi was focused more on wild crops instead of domestication). In two Mississippi sites, refuse pits showed remains of persimmon 80% of the time.⁴

The Mississippi Valley utilized “mound building” in their communities, which is still visible across the landscape today.

The Coles Creek culture, for example, which existed in the Lower Mississippi Valley between 700-1000 AD, relied heavily on acorns & pecans as their staple crops, but persimmon was frequently cited as the largest fruit crop as part of their diet, alongside grapes.⁵

What’s particularly interesting about the Coles Creek people of modern-day Louisiana is that they had a complex fisher-hunter-gatherer society that blended elements of the Mississippian Valley culture, the passive domestication of the same crops of the Eastern Agricultural Complex of the Adena, and despite being exposed to domesticated maize as early as 750, didn’t incorporate it into their diet as a staple until nearly 400 years later between 1000 and 1200. David Lentz argues that this shift wasn’t due to maize’s capacity as a crop but rather increasing pressure from the Lower Mississippi Valey, which valued maize for its role in ritual (and likely as a tool of centralization of power & civilization).

It wasn’t just the Cole Creek people who used persimmons as a staple in their diet—this appeared to be the case across the Lower Mississippi Valley prior to the arrival of maize. Even after the arrival of maize and its centralization within the Mississippi Valley, the persimmon played a central role in the diets of many indigenous groups, such as the Plaquemine, which utilized complex systems that incorporated maize fields alternated with groves of pecan, oak, and persimmon trees along the bottomland along river edges.⁶, ⁷

While the fruit was eaten fresh, much of it was stored for winter consumption. The most common method was drying the fruit, which could be consumed, dried, or ground into a powder and added to foods. John Smith described the Powhatan people, who called persimmon ‘putchamins,’ as preserving the persimmons by drying them on mats, similar to the drying process used for elderberries, a practice he referred to as making “Pruines.”⁸ The dried powder was used to make bread, with corn called “staninca” by the Quapaw, but the bread was made with persimmons and pulp as well (see below).

Another method was to cook the persimmon into a pulp that could be shaped into cakes and dried for preservation.⁹ Early travelers such as Jacques Gravier and John Bradbury documented these as gifts from Indigenous chiefs, suggesting they were prized and used as a tool of cultural and diplomatic exchange.¹⁰,¹¹ Additionally, the pulp could be made into preserves that were mixed with cornmeal or stews.

Spiced persimmon pecan bread (made with Asian persimmons, apparently).

The Rappahannock and others also used persimmon as a staple ingredient to create a type of beer, often with honey locust or mixed with cornmeal and allowed to ferment. This tradition continued into Appalachian culture until the present, although it has largely lost its historical connection. Beyond the fruit, the leaves were used for tea, and the bark was used for several medical concoctions.

Even after disease had ravaged the continent, when settlers arrived at abandoned settlements, they described how the landscape in the Mississippi region was covered in fruit and nut trees and, depending on the author, treated them as either orchards or simply well-tended wild landscapes.¹² It’s because of this that there is debate about whether or not the persimmon was in the process of domestication.

The persimmon has not only been significant for human survival on the continent but has been crucial in supporting native habitats. An aggressive, early succession species, it thrives on the edge of agriculture fields, grows quickly, and has been documented growing up to 6 feet in a year. While we noted the potential role of coyotes in seed dispersal, many mammals consume the fruit itself, including raccoons, opossums, deer, black bears, foxes, and squirrels, especially since the fruit fall from the trees so late into the winter, when few other foods are available.¹³

Birds also feast on fruits and seeds, although little research has been done to fully document their role in supporting native birds. However, we have at least 45 documented butterfly and moth species that rely on persimmon for survival, as well as numerous bees, both native and non-native.¹⁴ Beyond their role as a food source, their dense foliage and spreading branches are particularly valuable for birds and amphibians, who hide beneath the thick layer of leaf litter on the forest floor.

Through the early centuries of colonization, much of the persimmon across the landscape was removed, including many of the managed trees that had fed the Indigenous for generations. Interest waned for decades until the late 19th century, notably the period when Michigan Agricultural College (MAC) focused its efforts on native plants. A young man named James Troop graduated from MAC in 1878, four years before Liberty Hyde Bailey, but they had likely known one another while attending, as Troop remained with the school as a faculty member immediately after graduating.¹⁵ Regardless, decades later, they would work together, as Troop managed the Indiana Experimental station while Bailey oversaw national research projects.¹⁶ After finishing his Masters at MAC in 1883, he joined Purdue University’s Department of Horticulture, where he’d remain for most of his career and where we would take some of the first steps in the rebirth of interest in the American persimmon