2014 Grafting Adventures of CrazyED

[Rally1148]

I wish I had room for this! If I ever get my hands on a 40, I might just make a 5 acre clearing and plant apples as a central food plot!

 

[aerospacefarmer]

A combo of fruit/nut trees and white clover is about as close to a year round plot as a guy could get (in the north anyway)

And if you could add in a bit of brassicas you got the lethal deal booooom

 

[sandbur]

And if you could add in a bit of brassicas you got the lethal deal booooom

I would add standing corn and beans instead.

 

[buckvelvet]

Tough to grow corn and beans alongside fruit trees...clover and/or brassicas are "doable"

Tough to grow corn in beach sand. :)

 

[Jordan Selsor]

You guys looking for more root stock may check burnt ridge. My stuff from them looked good and prices were fare

 

[wiscwhip]

Tough to grow corn in beach sand. :)

Tell that to the idiots in the Central Sand Plain of WI that are sucking the watertable dry trying to irrigate corn(and other crops) and still ending up having to claim crop failure and getting a subsidy check from Uncle Sam.

 

[CrazyEd]

Got all my tags made up today and all of my supplies are ready. This is how I roll folks. I will finally get around to starting probably tomorrow night or Tuesday night. I actually write on both sides of my plastic tags because i find the sun will do a number on the permanent marker. I always put metal tags on before winter but hopefully double sided tags makes things easier.

 

[buckvelvet]

You guys looking for more root stock may check burnt ridge. My stuff from them looked good and prices were fare

I bought 12 more B118 and tried these guys yesterday to improve my success rate, i'm addicted, thanks to lots of you folks and Eds thread is a huge reason. :)

 

[buckvelvet]

The B118/M7 I got from cummin were really stout. This is my first go around but I was deff impressed.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

My Cummins rootstock was very nice. B-118 and MM-111. I'll be trying more grafting for sure. I've never had anything from Cummins that wasn't top-notch. (No Affiliation.)

 

[Turkey Creek]

Looks like Crazy Ed is ready for surgery!:)

Did some regrafts of failed rootstocks from last year yesterday. New root stocks should be here by the weekend.

 

[CrazyEd]

I just counted 12 more b118 out in my garden that failed last year and look good for grafting. More tough decisions to make, what else do I need more of. Good problem to have I guess.
=)

 

[Native Hunter]

Ed, That's a heck of a nice bunch of apple trees. Will you plant all of them for yourself or will you sell some of them?

If you plant all yourself, you should be selling apples someday.:)

 

[CrazyEd]

Ed, That's a heck of a nice bunch of apple trees. Will you plant all of them for yourself or will you sell some of them?

If you plant all yourself, you should be selling apples someday.:)

30-40 are for my closest friend, he paid for the roots. He has a small big woods property in the northern part of wisconsin. I enjoy helping him with habitat projects because our properties are so different. I'm looking forward to bear hunting there in 3 more years.

Badgerfowl gave me 2 nice duck houses for some trees.

The rest are going to the farm. Once I run out of room I might graft some trees to sell if I have time as a hobby. For now my focus is the farm. I should have around 75 varieties after this latest bunch. Not bad seeing I planted my first tree just 6 years ago.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

Ed - Post #208, What do you need more of ?? Hands ..... to be able to get all your grafting & planting done !!;) :D

 

[CrazyEd]

Ed - Post #208, What do you need more of ?? Hands ..... to be able to get all your grafting & planting done !!;) :D

Yes. Good call.

I was more thinking of what variety do i need more trees of to fill in those last 12 rootstocks that i found in my nursery?

 

[CrazyEd]

Well I finally had some time to get after it and have knocked out 38 trees in 2 sessions. I did 18 in round yesterday and another 20 today. 95% whip and tongue. I got warmed up on a bunch of varieties of trees I already have like Wolf River, Liberty, Dolgo and Kerr. Then I started knocking out the exciting new stuff I was able to collect wood for.

Rootstocks from Cummin's look excellent. They are big caliper, the one I measured was 1/2", i'd say that is average, some larger some smaller. Many had excellent roots. Here's 2 examples

 

[CrazyEd]

Here's a few of my comments about what i've been doing and what i've been learning through my experience.

1. I like whip and tongue more than other styles of grafting. I like locking them in and then wrapping them up nice and tight with 1" teflon plumbing tape before giving them a nice warm wax bath. I really like this tape, it's flexible and easy to work with, and cheap.
2. Sharp knife makes your life easier.
3. When working with larger caliper rootstocks, don't try to make one big glory cut going all the way through. In fact I dont even go across the whole rootstock. I just widdle down an edge on one side a little bit at a time with broad strokes. I'll try and get a picture of what I mean next time i graft some more trees. Most of these rootstocks are much larger than any of the scions i have. So the key for me is one getting a nice long flat smooth cut. I also examine the rootstock and try to find a nice 2" straight section where i'll make my cut. I do the same on the scion. I look for a nice straight section of the wood, so many are crooked and jagged. I find the straight side so I can hopefully match up one side of the root to one side of the scion. Again i'll only get one side to match so I make sure both are nice and straight and hopefully I get a good 1-1.5" line up of the cambiums. My tongue cuts are usually about 3/8" long. Some of my scions are very small so the key to adding a tongue to a small scion is going very slow and gently working your knife through the wood.
4. Take your time, do not rush. Take your time, do not rush. Take your time, do not rush. There will be less blood and your success rate will be much higher if you just take your time. Especially on the back cut, I just like to go real nice and slow gently rocking my knife back and fourth letting it do the work, just dont force it, thats how you'll draw blood.

Won't know how much success i have until august in my opinion, but I like the way things are going so far. Things seem to be lining up pretty well on my end.
Cheers
-Ed

 

[Freeborn]

Nice work Ed, you have made good progress. I have 25 I will start early next week. The rootstock I got from cummins looks great and is much bigger than the scion I have.

I'm going to try and use a razor knife and razor blade to help make my cuts as I think I can get good cuts.

Thanks again for the Kerr scion.

 

[Honker]

Nice set up Ed, one thing I tried this year was putting my wax in a tall glass jar and keeping it warm with a cheap $2 coffee warmer from goodwill. It keeps the wax at a perfect temperature for as long as you need it.