Grafting Chestnuts

[yoderjac]

I'm going to try grafting chestnuts this year. I understand that they significantly more difficult than most trees because they are monocots and for normal grafting techniques one needs to align vascular bundles which is more difficult than in dicots.

I've seen several methods used with varying levels of success: Traditional Grafting, Nut Grafting, Seedling Grafting, and Green Grafting.

I plan to buy some chestnut scions from Cliff England and try traditional field grafting on some of the Dunstans I've planted in previous years. Wayne (Wbpdeer) is being gracious enough to send me some Chinese chestnuts that I plan to use to experiment with some different forms of nut and seedling grafting.

I've done a bunch of reading and seen what others do. I hope to do some combination and variation of what I've seen. I'll use this thread to report back on successes and failures from time to time.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Merle Hawggard]

Jack,
At one time I had an old report on chestnut culture in New Jersey or New York saved at work though my computer fried and I lost the file.
I was from the early 1900's and gave many examples of how to graft chestnuts. They had whole orchards of paragon grafted to American sprouts with a whip and tongue graft. They even claimed to have success grafting to red oak.
If I can find it again I'll post the link. It and Chestnut in Tennessee are great just to see how important chestnuts were at that time.

 

[yoderjac]

That would be great!

 

[DLH]

I'm giving the ozark chinkapins a go on Chinese this year as I have been told that it works. Of the nut grafting methods I liked the inverted radicle graft the best because I had the most success with it and if the graft failed the nut still grew unlike nut grafting. I'm moving more towards grafting seedlings due to the intensive care of nut grafting which is no concern to you as you grow chestnuts well. I have some American chestnuts seedlings I'm trying to graft for our state TACF chapter this spring so I'll see how those go as well. My plan with the Ozarks on Chinese is to etoilate the Chinese and graft the ozarks to them I have been told that etoliation helps with compatibility issues. What methods are you trying for field grafting? I'm wondering if bark grafting would work well?

 

[yoderjac]

I'm glad to see others doing this as well. Ozark and Allegheny chinquapins are so close and since Allegheny grow wild on my place, I'm simply propagating those. I tried inverted radicle one year but it was mostly just for technique practice and I tried straight nut grafting. I had problems getting a bond with inverted radicle. It seemed the radicle wanted to break on me. I think the straight nut grafting may have worked if I had provided proper after care. I presumed my grow boxes were enough but I think you really need a very high humidity environment. I also like the idea of etoilation. I may give that a try.

I'm not sure what method I'm going to use in the field. I had a chat with Cliff England about it. He suggested going to the field and getting a few branches from my Dunstans and pealing the bark off. He said to identify the vascular bundles. He said to use whatever grafting technique allows me to align the bundles consistently. I haven't done that yet. My sense is that bark grafting would probably not be a good candidate but I don't really know that.

My intent with field grafting is to see if I can bring some of the trees into earlier production. I'm looking at the other techniques or cloning trees with characteristics I like.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Merle Hawggard]

Chestnut Culture in the Northeast by E A Sterling. I had a downloaded version but here is an online link.
https://www.slideshare.net/mobile/FalXda/k3f560-17329770

 

[Merle Hawggard]

Also while not about grafting, a great read.
https://archive.org/details/chestnutintennes00ashe

 

[yoderjac]

Thanks for the links Merle!

 

[DLH]

Jack this site states chestnuts are some of the easier nut trees to graft and they can be bark grafted too. The main problem with chestnuts is compatibility issues according to them.

http://www.songonline.ca/opportunities/barkgrafting.htm

I'm concussed on the monocot and dicot statement too. Everything I found stated chestnuts were dicots most of the monocots aren't tree type plants like herbs bamboo ferns wheat etc. what do you think of this?

 

[yoderjac]

Jack this site states chestnuts are some of the easier nut trees to graft and they can be bark grafted too. The main problem with chestnuts is compatibility issues according to them.

http://www.songonline.ca/opportunities/barkgrafting.htm

I'm concussed on the monocot and dicot statement too. Everything I found stated chestnuts were dicots most of the monocots aren't tree type plants like herbs bamboo ferns wheat etc. what do you think of this?

Maybe I got that wrong (wouldn't be the first time). The conclusion came based on some reading I was doing on grafting monocots and Cliff's description of the vascular bundles. I may have jumped to that conclusion. At any rate, as Cliff described it to me, the trick is to consistently align those vascular bundles. Bark grafting is a bit different. I don't know that it won't work. I have not tried it. It just doesn't seem consistent with Cliff's description.

I have not yet had a chance to go afield and cut some chestnut branches to peal and get a good handle on what Cliff is talking about. You and others are probably ahead of me with this. I also appreciate all the links folks have posted.

I have also heard about rootstock/scion incompatibility. I was encouraged by what I read in your link. I'll mostly be grafting Chinese to Chinese or Chinese/American hybrids.

I know you have been successful with nut grafting. Have you done any field grafting of chestnuts yet?

Thanks,

Jack

 

[DLH]

No I haven't tried any yet with chestnuts I'm considering it this year though due to this thread. I might try to talk Native Hunter into grafting a limb on one of his Chinese chestnuts just to see he's fed my grafting habit the last couple years. I'm curious of all grafting no matter the species or technique.

What do you think about a 3 or 4 flap graft like they do for pecans? Do you have any links to the vascular bundles I can't get my brain around that?

Also it's harder to find information on grafting outside of fruit trees but what I have found is that almost all species graft similarly but some need certain temperatures to callus and grafting isn't always the best propagation method. I really like the idea of bark grafting though it's very easy and the roots are established well to heal the union over quickly.

 

[yoderjac]

No I haven't tried any yet with chestnuts I'm considering it this year though due to this thread. I might try to talk Native Hunter into grafting a limb on one of his Chinese chestnuts just to see he's fed my grafting habit the last couple years. I'm curious of all grafting no matter the species or technique.

What do you think about a 3 or 4 flap graft like they do for pecans? Do you have any links to the vascular bundles I can't get my brain around that?

Also it's harder to find information on grafting outside of fruit trees but what I have found is that almost all species graft similarly but some need certain temperatures to callus and grafting isn't always the best propagation method. I really like the idea of bark grafting though it's very easy and the roots are established well to heal the union over quickly.

I have not used the 3 or 4 flap yet. When I tried grafting pecan to hickory, I used a bark graft. I got the word on aligning vascular bundles from Cliff and started googling it. That may have been where I was reading about then with respect to monocots. I could not find any references that were distinct to chestnuts. Cliff does know his stuff.

I too like bark grafting. I found it by far the easiest and most successful method with persimmons. I understand the key is bark slippage and I'm not sure all trees are the same in bark slippage.

When I asked Cliff about when he grafts chestnuts he responded: "We graft into the 10 thousand range of trees annually and except for apple and pear everything is leaved out we graft from may till mid-July with a better than 90% success rate except for walnuts and pecans".

Thanks,

Jack

 

[ncstewart]

No I haven't tried any yet with chestnuts I'm considering it this year though due to this thread. I might try to talk Native Hunter into grafting a limb on one of his Chinese chestnuts just to see he's fed my grafting habit the last couple years. I'm curious of all grafting no matter the species or technique.

What do you think about a 3 or 4 flap graft like they do for pecans? Do you have any links to the vascular bundles I can't get my brain around that?

Also it's harder to find information on grafting outside of fruit trees but what I have found is that almost all species graft similarly but some need certain temperatures to callus and grafting isn't always the best propagation method. I really like the idea of bark grafting though it's very easy and the roots are established well to heal the union over quickly.

http://extension.uga.edu/publications/detail.cfm?number=B1376#Four


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[yoderjac]

http://extension.uga.edu/publications/detail.cfm?number=B1376#Four


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I don't think he was looking for the "how to" on the 4 flap grafting technique. We were looking for information like what specific grafting techniques work best for specific nut trees. For example, is a 4 flap graft more successful with chestnuts than a whip and tongue. Or, things like specific modifications of a grafting method that increase success with chestnuts and other non-fruit trees. This kind of information seems to be harder to find.

Great example of the 4-flap though.

Thanks,

jack

 

[homegrownbucks]

Google sober and grafting chestnut, he is the guy

 

[yoderjac]

Google sober and grafting chestnut, he is the guy

Some interesting stuff. Wish there was more detail on grafting chestnut to oak. From what I read, it sounds like W&T may be better than cleft for field grafting.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[DLH]

Jack any of the Chinese chestnuts you planted have any later drop times?

 

[yoderjac]

They are advertised to be. In addition to the Dunstan's I've started from seed, I purchased a package from the wildlife group a couple years ago that included 2 AU Buck III and 2 AU Buck IV chestnuts. The AU Buck IVs are supposed to be late drop. I potted them up in 3 gal RB2s, overwintered them, and grew them on my deck. The Very first year the AU Buck IVs produced a few viable nuts. I collected them and cold stratified them. Unfortunately, they accidently got mixed with my Dunstans. If they germinated, they got planted, but since they got mixed in, they were not labeled.

So, last year, I decided to keep them on my deck for another summer. I've collected nuts from both AU Buck III and AU Buck IV female parents. I was more careful this year. I planted them a bit a go and the first one from an AU Buck III mother popped tonight. Since the AU Buck III and AU Buck IVs were the only sexually mature chestnuts anywhere near my deck, I presume the nuts are a cross since genetically identical chestnuts can't pollinate themselves. All of the Dunstans on my deck were ungrafted first year seedlings so I'm sure they did not provide pollen.

I'm hoping that some percentage of the AU Buck III x AU Buck IV have the late drop characteristic of the AU Buck IV Parent. I have not verified drop times in my area of the AU Buck trees from the wildlife group yet.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[DLH]

Nice how long do you think it will take for your cross to produce nuts? Chestnuts are fairly quick to produce correct? I just was curious if you had anything late that wasn't patented that you could spare some scions? Are you going to continue to try and cross pollinate your III and IV by hand?

 

[yoderjac]

I'd say they are quick compared to standard oak trees, but when you plant seedlings it does take some time for trees to mature. I have Dunstans that are about 1 1/2 inch in diameter and about 12' tall last year that did not flower. I'm guessing I'll see them start next year.

Grafted trees will produce nuts much faster. The AU Buck trees I got were nutgrafted in the winter and put in Jiffy pots. Those that survived were transplanted into 5" roottrapper bags (all of this at the Wildlife Group). They were sent to me in November in the 5" bags. I immediately transplanted them into 3 gal RB2s and kept them in my garage over the winter. It was the very next spring (their second growing season) that they produced nuts. I've never seen a non-grafted chestnut produce nuts anywhere near that fast. That is one reason I'm looking at grafting them. I plan to get some scions from mature trees and graft some of my younger Dunstan trees in the field. I also want to play around with nut/seedling grafting.

My chestnuts are not old enough to produce yet. I have plenty of producing native Allegheny Chinquapins on my place but not chestnuts. I do plan to watch drop times of my trees as they come on line and collect scions from late droppers, but that will be a few years down the pike.

After collecting nuts from the AU Buck III and IV this year, I planted them at the farm. Chestnuts are wind pollenated so trees that are far apart are practically sexually isolated. I planted the AU Buck IIIs and IVs alternating close to each other and the group is far from any other chestnuts. So while I don't plan to cross pollinate them by hand, I presume nature will do that for me. If I can get to the nuts before the squirrels and deer, I will collet them and plant them. I may even consider buying a few more just to keep in containers for nut collection at home but I haven't done that yet.

Thanks,

Jack