Moody Ecology
Sustainable Harvest of Persimmon
Persimmons (Diospyros virginiana) are one of the premier fruit trees native to North America. These sun-loving trees, growing along fence rows and wood edges, produce succulent, sweet fruits that ripen in the fall. Ripe fruits have a rich custardy taste.
I began studying persimmons through a collaborative project with the Osage Nation Historic Preservation Office, when I worked at the Kansas Biological Survey. The Osage and Pea Ridge National Military Park (PERI) were interested in exploring the possibility of the Osage harvesting persimmon fruit from PERI, located within the Osage ancestral homelands, after the National Park Service issued a rule that provides a pathway for Indigenous people to harvest plants from NPS land holdings.
Pea Ridge
Osage Nation
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Osage Ancestral Homelands
Our role in this project was demonstrating persimmon fruits could be sustainably harvested at PERI. Combining our field-collected data with NPS data on persimmon tree density and potential persimmon habitat, we estimated annual production of persimmon fruits at PERI to be of about 143,000 fruits or about 1,990 kg (4100 lbs). We also applied that At-Risk Assessment Tool to persimmons, showing that harvesting the fruits does not risk overharvesting persimmon populations. You can read our published work in Ethnobotany Research and Applications.
My contributions to the project:
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conducting initial field surveys, mapping sites for data collection
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developing field sampling protocols
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collecting field data
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analyzing and managing data
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creating methods for estimating persimmon yield
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writing and editing of reports and manuscript