The leaf is rather leathery and dark green without teeth on the margin. Its average length is about 4 inches. The tree is well known for its delicious orange fruit and bark, resembling alligator hide. Like black gum, persimmon is a prolific sprouter. Fruit, buds and leaves are a source of food for deer, opposum, gray and fox squirrel, quail, raccoon, wild turkey, red and grey fox and coyote.
Many birds make persimmon fruit a part of their diet.
It is very important as a wildlife food. Persimmon wood is hard and dense. It is used for golf club heads, handles for files and carving tools, billiard cues, shuttles and mallets. History records that Confederat soldiers boiled persimmon seeds as a substitute for coffee. When De Soto crossed the Mississippi, he observed that persimmon played an important role in the Indian diet.