Plant · P-428

Date Plum

Diospyros lotus

Date plum fruit turns blue-black and cherry-sized, and like its persimmon relatives it is harsh and astringent until nearly overripe, at which point it turns rich and sweet - dried, it takes on a date-like flavour, which is where the name comes from. Its seedlings are the standard rootstock used for grafting Japanese persimmon. The tree throws no root suckers, unlike American persimmon, so it spreads only by animal-carried seed, and its long taproot makes transplanting difficult once it is past the seedling stage.