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I have a persimmon tree in our courtyard which delivers about 110 baseball-sized persimmons each year. That damage shown (first 3 pictures) is probably from insects or storm etc. The ornamental pears trees (last 3 pictures) got theirs from deer in the yard. I see a lot of suggestions from wound care substances containing bees wax, and there's wound care tape, etc..

The edges have all rounded over it looks like but if there were any way to encourage the wound to seal up again, that would be great. I am new to this, appreciate your assistance. enter image description here

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I sincerely doubt that will ever happen for the large persimmon. The bulk of the interior of the tree appears to be dead and rotting, and the odds of it living long enough to close the gap without breaking since much of its structure is missing are low.

The younger/smaller pears might manage to grow together, though they will always retain some interior damage, and that might impact them poorly in the future as an avenue for insect or disease attack. You may be better off in the long run replacing them and protecting the new ones from deer attack.

Tree wound dressing products are pretty much snake oil or possibly snake venom - many actually impede the tree's self-healing effort - none actually help it to heal, from everything I've read. Here's one example https://extension.unh.edu/blog/2019/07/should-i-cover-large-pruning-wounds-tree-wound-dressing

Edit: Everything I've read not from people with an interest in selling the stuff; those people perpetuate the bad advice because they don't make any money if you follow good advice.

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  • Thank you, that was a perspective I guess I remember from long ago, when I used to prune trees as side-jobs.
    – Oliver Williams
    Apr 9, 2022 at 12:24
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    I've lived in deer country and had some "just trees around the place" rubbed pretty badly by deer; they all survived just fine - even a chokecherry in which a buck had rubbed at least 85% of the bark off! This surprised the heck out of me because I thought the upper limit of deer-rub-survivability was 50-60%. None broke off in storms while we lived there, so I think the pears will be fine but, being ornamental pears, will probably die in 15-20 years anyway, unfortunately.
    – Jurp
    Apr 9, 2022 at 13:43
  • The approach could be to buy new trees, that is more than bark damage.
    – blacksmith37
    Apr 9, 2022 at 15:58

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