Hello, 

At our local community garden we have an American Persimmon which was planted in 2019 as a young tree received from a NYRP spring tree giveaway. In the years since, the tree has gotten fairly large and has fruited for the past three years (I know they are generally dioecious, but can occasionally be monoecious, which I believe ours is). A couple years ago someone kept leaving 4'x8' sheets of plywood propped up near the tree which I was concerned would fall and hurt the tree, and so I kept moving them out of the way. Unfortunately, someone moved them back right before a bad storm and the plywood fell onto the tree during the storm and gouged it pretty badly. In the ensuing months the tree started to show signs of a fungal infection -- black spots on leaves, some yellowing or discolored leaves, but nothing too severe.

The next spring the tree leafed out mostly normally but there were a few branches with underdeveloped leaves that were a splotchy yellow and green, and others with black spots. It was sprayed a couple times that year with a copper fungicide spray. The following spring (2023), the infection was more pronounced, with entire branches diseased and/or dead, including the leader branch. The diseased branches were pruned out and the tree was sprayed with a copper fungicide again maybe twice, and then was sprayed with Arber's bio fungicide on a few other occasions. Nothing seemed to make a difference and the infection seemed to be getting worse. Also this season, the tree started to sucker quite a bit and so a number of new trees were popping up around it.

I decided to have a more hands-off approach this spring, given that the fungicide sprays weren't helping, and tried to have hope that the tree would push through on its own. I did prune out a few branches that seemed dead, but otherwise did not intervene. Interestingly, the cross section of the larger branches looked half-dead/half-alive with a black streak dividing the two sides. Sadly, most of the tree looks pretty awful this year. There is one mostly normal branch that has typical-sized leaves and has flowered, but the rest has undersized, distorted, and discolored leaves.

I feel a bit sentimental about this tree, and also hate to lose all of those years of growth and have to start over, but I am wondering if there is anything at all that can be done to save it, or if it should be cut down? If it is removed, would it be okay to leave the small suckering trees to allow them to take over, or do they run the risk of developing the same infection? If it is all removed, will anything be able to be planted in this spot or is it an area that should be left alone for a few years?