T-Budding Season - It's almost here!

[CrazyEd]

It's almost T-Budding time! I usually do my tbuds middle to end of August in southeast Wisconsin. Just gotta get your knife out and go see if the bark is slipping and how the fresh bud-wood looks - is it mature. T-Budding is a great way to take a bench graft that failed in spring, or maybe one from a previous year and take another crack at it. I make a t-shaped cut on the rootstock, and take a fresh piece of bud-wood. Cut off a single bud, make sure you remove any wood from the back of the bud. For good measure I like to put 2 buds on a rootstock in case one fails. Tape it up and let it be.

You might get a bud that fall yet and even some decent growth or it may stay dormant until spring depending on when you grafted it and what the conditions are. If it does grow, if the tree doesn't harden off in time you could see some die back during winter, but in my experience that didnt have an impact the following year. The picture below I think this bud grew 10" before winter.

Here is one early spring, you can see it didnt really grow the fall before, but it is swelled up nice in spring so we know the graft was successful. As you can see I made an angle cut above the bud to remove the rest of the tree. That way all the energy from the tree and the roots goes straight into that bud and up.

Here is another example. These were grafted last fall, and didn't really do anything last fall.

March 29th

April 29th - both buds popped and are growing upward, each is about 3" tall. At this point I typically pick one and pinch the other. In this picture there are actually 2 trees so it's a bit confusing what is what.

May 18th. Here it's more obvious that each tree has a single leader, and they are about 10-12" tall at this point

June 4th - probably 15-18" tall. The bigger leaves pictured are about the size of my palm.

July 19th - its hard to see but the top of these 2 trees is just below the top of the fence, and they are probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 40-48". They are just going gang busters. Should be close to 6' by the end of the growing season. If I keep them at home another year they should be beautifully feathered trees for the spring of 2018. They will be 8-9' tall with 3-4 beautiful branches.

T-budding is really easy, try it if you haven't!

 

[Turkey Creek]

I am going to try some T-budding again this fall. I have tried in the past and had poor success. I think I was doing it at the wrong time of year (though some say T-buds and chip buds can be done anytime). That and I never removed the wood, had read that it was not necessary, but I do think your success increases without the wood. CE have you found that the leaf petiole does fall off in 2-3 weeks if the bud is a take?

 

[CrazyEd]

CE have you found that the leaf petiole does fall off in 2-3 weeks if the bud is a take?

I have not monitored that close. But generally speaking i've had great luck with the few tbuds i've done.

 

[chickenlittle]

I am getting excited about T-budding. Checking out which grafts failed. Which trees have good budwood. Which I'll save for scionwood this winter. I got lots of rootstock to bud.

TC, I think you would have poor success without removing the wood from the back for a T-bud as it affects you cambium contact. I think the petioles fell off before or when I removed the grafting tape from my Tbuds. I did not track that vs my success either.

 

[buckvelvet]

When I cut the wrappings of a few of my trees I could barely touch the tree and the bark slipped like crazy, its been 90 for a week here. I'd be shocked if it didn't slip awesome for ya'll right now.

 

[bornagain62511]

Turkey Creek, the leaf petiole will turn a dark almost black color within 2 weeks if it was successful. T-buds that fail will have leaf petioles that remain green or turn yellowish, but will not turn blackish color within 2 weeks. Also, and even better indicator is if you push down slightly on the tip of the leaf petiole, about 2 weeks after t-budding, if it was successful it will "snap" or "pop" off and drop away from the bud (like a dry brittle stick would when you break it). Comparing that to one that fails, the petiole will not "pop" but it will sort of stay attached to the bud, almost like the petiole wants to stay attached to the bud.

I'm pumped for t-budding this year too, and it should be the best conditions I've ever seen as we have had consistent rains all summer. In the past, I think every year I've t-budded we've had hot dry weather leading up to early August which really reduces the slipping in the bark and reduces the chance of success for the new bud. Also, this year I have far more B-118 rootstocks to t-bud to, whereas in the past most of my budding was done to rootstocks which I grew from seed that I collected from wild trees which showed good potential. I've observed that the B-118 trees produce a much higher quality rootstock and when they grow into fruit producing size, they are much more stout in the trunk and have a great root system. The rootstocks I grew from wild apple seed were really inconsistent. Some are probably 15 years old and are doing excellent, but some are almost that old and are scrawny and hardly growing. Genetics vary so much with the seed grown rootstocks. buying B-118 rootstocks from Willamette Nursery for the past 5 years or so has been the best decision ever. Wish I had known all that I know about this 15-20 years ago!

 

[yoderjac]

I tried some earlier this year. I think I was too early. I think most of it turned black. This was my first attempt.

 

[Spur]

I grafted 25 trees last year but none took. I have no idea what i did wrong. I think I didn't cut my t deep enough. I peeled the t away and I saw 2 layers. The first layer was green and a little deeper layer was yellow/white.

I cut the bud about a half inch above and a half inch below. I then pulled a small section of the wood from the center of the wood out from below the cambium. I then took that bud and placed it ON TOP OF the green layer of the rootstock. I then covered the bud with the bark and used grafting tape above and below the bud to hold in place. I then covered the graft with toilet bowl wax.

What do you think went wrong? What should I do differently this year?

 

[bornagain62511]

I grafted 25 trees last year but none took. I have no idea what i did wrong. I think I didn't cut my t deep enough. I peeled the t away and I saw 2 layers. The first layer was green and a little deeper layer was yellow/white.

I cut the bud about a half inch above and a half inch below. I then pulled a small section of the wood from the center of the wood out from below the cambium. I then took that bud and placed it ON TOP OF the green layer of the rootstock. I then covered the bud with the bark and used grafting tape above and below the bud to hold in place. I then covered the graft with toilet bowl wax.

What do you think went wrong? What should I do differently this year?

You need to put the bud below the "bark" layer. The inside most layer of the bud needs to be touching the inner yellow/greenish "trunk" of wood, which is below the thin "bark" layer which peels, or "slips" away from the trunk. hope that helps. also, one of the most important "tools" for me is this "Buddy Tape", all you need to do is wrap above and below the t-bud well with this and walk away. It is stretchy and kind of adheres to itself like shrink wrap, but it's even better than that for t-budding or grafitng. There's nothing else like it that I know of: http://www.groworganic.com/1-buddy-grafting-tape-approx-130.html

You might want to watch some videos. There are a couple of videos on the web page at the link above with the buddy tape. here's a couple more. just search for "t-budding fruit trees" or something like that on youtube to find more helpful videos. Here's a couple that might help:

 

[chickenlittle]

Thanks for the buddy tape recommendation. I will try it this year. I used PVC tape last year but it needs removed from Tbuds after a few weeks. I removed tape early on some because I couldn't get back for several weeks. Having a secure wrap without having to remove it should be a great improvement for me for success and time.

 

[buckvelvet]

Environmentally friendly film is biodegradable in sunlight, Buddy Tape works well in hot and cold weather.

So this tape physically falls away over time, but how much time?

 

[bornagain62511]

So this tape physically falls away over time, but how much time?

Yes. I've t-budded well over several hundred apple trees, and I've never had to remove this buddy tape. Simply come back the following March to prune off the rootstock above the T-bud, and leave the remaining tape as it is on the rootstock. it breaks down in the sun and weather. I wrap the rootstock tightly with it around the t-bud and as the tree grows in circumference the following year, it has no problem pushing out the tape as it is kind of elastic, even with several layers wrapped around the trunk of the rootstock. the tape is stretchy and kind of adheres to itself like shrink wrap, but it's even better than that, it's kind of hard to explain exactly what it's like since there's nothing else like it that I know of, but it's probably most similar to shrink wrap. It's somewhere between a stretchy rubber band and shrink wrap if that makes sense. but totally biodegradable

 

[Lot2Learn]

Here's the best video I've seen on T-budding:

 

[buckvelvet]

After reading the descriptions of this tape it sounds an awfully like lot parafilm. I am currently in the process of unwrapping all my nursery stock and the parafilm for the most part is half off naturally or unwraps quite easily.

 

[yoderjac]

There are several kinds of parafilm. I found some don't work as well as others for grafting (I'm just starting with T-budding but I've been grafting for a number of years). I like parafilm-M.

 

[Turkey Creek]

I have both Buddy Tape and Parafilm M both are basicially the same product. But the Buddy Tape is a narrower width and not as think as the Parafilm M.

Those of you who have had very good success with T-budding could you list the growing zone you are in and the time of year you T-budded? I am going to wait until the end of August to try it again, hoping the worst of the heat will be over and the tree wont try and push any successful buds. Our first frost is not typically until around the beginning of October.

 

[Spur]

I spent some time with Steve from Cummins nursery yesterday inquiring and learning. They are in full swing with bud grafting and they are located in Ithaca, NY for your reference.

Steve told me that they have the most success with chip grafting and not t budding so I went home and grafted a few trees. My trees are in their prime right now for grafting as the bark is slipping great.

Btw, Steve uses bud grafting strips and gave me a few to try. I will say that for small Rootstock the grafting strips are much better than parafilm. On a 1" and greater Rootstock, much better with parafilm. I took a selfie in the Cummins nursery but I can't load it from my phone.

 

[Spur]

Btw, Steve said to chip graft 2 buds, not one, to a rootstock.

 

[Corey Peterson]

I didn't have any luck with chip buds last year 0 for 4, but all the T-buds I did on root stock took (Qty 6). All but one of those has put on at least 2ft of growth this year. The night before grafting I wet down the bud wood pretty heavily, and watered each root stock with 5 gallons of water, and I made sure to keep up with the watering after that. Grafted on Aug 20th zone 5. I had extra bud wood that I tried T- budding on to smaller limbs of established trees and none of those took it seems like on more established trees the bark tries to heal over the T-bud - I'll probably try this again this year on newer growth and maybe try trimming back the flap of bark a bit. Those are my rookie observations after trying it for the first time last year.

 

[buckvelvet]

I tried to follow what Stephen was saying about removing the tape, do ya'll just wait for spring and remove the tape if you can see the bud swelling?