Opinions on grafted trees

[Jimmy G]

Last year I successfully grafted a number of apple scions on B118 rootstocks. I proceeded to fall plant them in their permanent locations and they seemed like they did well. One of the strange things was that the upper leaves remained attached almost all winter. And we had terrible cold weather and a lot of snow. I'm in east central Minnesota. So this spring amazingly they all survived. But a number of them had what seemed like winter dieback. The lower parts of last years growth leafed out nicely this year and have been growing, but some have the top 8-12 inches with no leaves. Now I've been really patient, not wanting to lop off the presumed dieback. Almost daily I check and see if any buds show any hints of growth. I mean we are well into the growing season. So tonight I had to see if they really were dead at the top. I go ahead and snip off the "dieback" and as I look really close I see a tiny bit of green growth.
Well that was dumb.
Is this normal to see such slow awakening of upper buds on young trees?

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[sandbur]

Last year I successfully grafted a number of apple scions on B118 rootstocks. I proceeded to fall plant them in their permanent locations and they seemed like they did well. One of the strange things was that the upper leaves remained attached almost all winter. And we had terrible cold weather and a lot of snow. I'm in east central Minnesota. So this spring amazingly they all survived. But a number of them had what seemed like winter dieback. The lower parts of last years growth leafed out nicely this year and have been growing, but some have the top 8-12 inches with no leaves. Now I've been really patient, not wanting to lop off the presumed dieback. Almost daily I check and see if any buds show any hints of growth. I mean we are well into the growing season. So tonight I had to see if they really were dead at the top. I go ahead and snip off the "dieback" and as I look really close I see a tiny bit of green growth.
Well that was dumb.
Is this normal to see such slow awakening of upper buds on young trees?

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I am seeing the same thing on seedlings and on a couple of established trees.

One opinion was that the vascular system was cold damaged and time will tell. Probably good advice???

I am tempted to just snip that off and let the normal growth continue from below.

I suspect your case is new growth cold dieback/ damage. When I have a whole tree like Burgundy on antanovka doing that, I wonder if the Burgundy suffered cold stress, or could part of the rootstock have been cold damaged. Are antanovka rootstocks seedlings where hardiness could be variable?


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[cavey]

Jimmy, My established grafts from 2017 had significant die back and mortality and I am seeing a number of them with dead tops, which in the long run maybe is not such a big deal as the original scion is still alive and or old new growth above that is sending up more new growth so its not a 100% loss. (Im hoping it works out the same as just topping or cutting back a foot or so off on the trees which is something I have gotten into the habit of doing anyways for the first couple years) I did have a lot more die back down to the root stock this year than what I normally see. Those of which are now going to be used for later grafting opportunities.

The leaves staying on is normal - I see it a lot -- or at least I would say it not abnormal but common.

Im likely just east of you and we got our butts handed to us with the cold snaps.

My antanovka root stock seem to be pretty bullet proof. Not sure how the B118 will fair.

 

[Telemark]

I go ahead and snip off the "dieback" and as I look really close I see a tiny bit of green growth.
Well that was dumb

I doubt you did any harm.

They had a brutal winter in Ontario, and I had a lot of die-back on my trees there. Even some of the local wild apple trees had damage. Some of the growth was dead, but some seemed to be struggling like the one you cut there. I cut off anything dead or damaged. The trees responded well by pushing out new buds below the cuts.

My guess is it's better for the tree to grow a new healthy leader/branch than to struggle with damaged tissue.