Air Layering

[yoderjac]

Hello everyone. I have never posted anything here before so this might be formatted wrong.

Anyway I was clearing brush around a small wild apple tree not long ago. Finding one of the lower branches buried under leaves, I yanked it up thinking I was helping it. Turns out it had grown roots 2 to 3 inches long and was firmly established. So I replanted it of course. This made me think that if layering can happen spontaneously surely it can also be done deliberately by a person.

I've seen that done where a branch is bent down to the ground and buried. I think that method has a much higher chance of success since the tree has much more time to root. Above ground methods have a limited time before you must remove it from the parent tree and plant it to protect the roots from winter. With the bend-and-burry method, you can wait more than one season for roots to develop. I would guess that even hard to root trees like persimmons could be done with this method.

Thanks,

Jack