Discussion

Diospyros Kaki

The genus Diospyros is comprised of at least 700 species of deciduous trees, evergreen trees, and shrubs; some sources suggest there may be as many a 1000 species. Various species of Diospyros are useful ornamentals. Others are valued for their wood (see Ebony below). Many others bear fruit, generally called persimmons. Some of these are edible by humans, others not. The most common and popular edible persimmons are Diospyros kaki, or just kaki in Japanese. It is Japan's national fruit, though technically, it is a berry.

Japan has two popular varieties of kaki, an astringent variety called hachiya, cultivated in China for more than two thousand years and imported to Japan in the 7th century A.D., and a non-astringent variety native to Japan called fuyu. Hachiya are slightly elongated and slightly pointed like an acorn, and fuyu have flat bottoms.

Hachiya are highly astringent because they are loaded with tannin. The amount of tannin diminishes at they ripen, so they shouldn't be eaten until they are fully mature. Even then, it is best to allow them to age until the interior turns really soft and pulpy. They are very sweet then.

Fuyu kaki have some tannin, but very little. When mature, fuyu are good to eat fresh and crisp, with or without the skin, like apples. Even the core is edible, but watch out for seeds. Fuyu are good sliced and dried, too. 

Some kaki are seedless, especially modern varieties, but many have them.

There are a lot of D. kaki tree cultivars with a variety of heights and widths. Commonly, they grow 20 to 30 feet tall and spread from 15 to 25 feet wide though some can be much larger; some sources say as much as 60 feet tall.

D. kaki trees are deciduous with large simple leaves.

Some types of persimmon tree have exclusively male or female blossoms and require trees of both kinds to produce fruit, but individual D. kaki trees generally have blossoms of both types and are self-fertilizing. 

Young kaki fruit are developing in the photo below, but it is way too early to eat these.

n the autumn, D. kaki leaves turn yellow and orange before falling.Red persimmon leaves

It is not uncommon for kaki leaves to drop to the ground while the fruit is still in the final stages of ripening.

Diospyros ebenum

A close relative of D. kaki is D. ebenum, also known as ebony. The core of the trunk is usually black, extremely dense, and very hard. It is one of the few woods that is denser than water; i.e., it sinks.

These characteristics have made ebony highly prized by wood carvers. Ebony carvings have been found in ancient Egyptian tombs. The photo below is an example. In spite of its appearance, the carving has not been treated. Its sheen is the natural result of fine sanding. 

Haiku

This haiku by Matsuo Bashō (1644 – 1694) has sometimes been called A Crow on a Bare Branch. It is one of his most famous poems and is deemed a true masterpiece. The season is both explicitly and implicitly identified as autumn. The word is there and a branch is bare; its leaves have fallen. It is in the evening, evoking an atmosphere of gloom in a season of cooling temperatures and of dead or dying things. Completing the picture is a crow; a black bird perched against the darkening sky in a country that associates solitary crows with death; they escort souls of the departed to the next phase of existence. One commentator called the scene sketched by the poem "dreary," a word that brings Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven to mind ("Once upon a midnight dreary ..."). One can easily imagine Bashō's crow solemnly saying, "Nevermore."

Artwork

Sakai Hōitsu (Japanese, 1761 – 1828)

Hōitsu was a prominent member of the Rinpa school of art based on his self-study of the works of Ogata Kōrin, duplication of some of Kōrin's greatest works, and his imitation of Kōrin's decorative style of painting. This bi-fold byōbu of kaki was painted in 1816.

Nakayama Sūgakudō (active 1850 - 1860)

Sūgakudō was a student of Utagawa Hiroshige (1797 – 1858). One of his works was an 1859 book of prints titled Forth-eight Hawks Drawn from Life. Number 35 of that series has Japanese white-eye birds (mejiro) and kaki.

Ohara Koson (1877 – 1945)

Koson was at the forefront of the early 20th century shin-hanga movement to restore traditional subjects, values, and techniques to Japanese woodblock works of art. He did several paintings featuring kaki. This first one features a crow eating a kaki; fitting, considering Bashō's haiku discussed above. It is a good thing that this painting is not a haiga.

nstead of a crow perching on a (nearly) bare branch, this time it is a monkey.

This last Koson print features a nuthatch and kaki. Kaki are popular with birds as well as humans.