Unusual Apple Grafting Question

[yoderjac]

I'm familiar with normal grafting where dormant scion wood is grafted to either dormant or growing hardened rootstock. There are also various budding techniques. While I have not seen it done with apples, there is a "green grafting" technique I've seen used with chestnuts where green wood is used on both understock and the scion.

Has anyone every tried grafting a dormant scion to young rootstock that has not yet hardened? I understand that this might not make sense in most situations given success with other grafting methods. The situation where it would be beneficial is when I grow rootstock from seed indoors under lights. The diameter of the rootstock is more than sufficient and having enough time for new growth after grafting to harden before fall is not an issue with the early start.

The benefit would be that I could do the grafting indoors under more controlled conditions until the grafts take and then continue to grow them in containers outside through the summer. The benefit would be that when planted in the fall, all the grafting would be complete, and much of the first seasons growth would be with the grafted portion rather than removing significant growth the following spring to graft.

Thoughts? Anything that would prevent this from working? Anything I should watch out for if I give it a try. Is it worth experimenting with?

Thanks,

Jack

 

[chickenlittle]

Try chip budding.

 

[yoderjac]

Try chip budding.

Can chip budding be done with dormant scion buds?

 

[chickenlittle]

Chip budding can be done with dormant scionwood or summer budwood. You can store your scionwood until you are ready to chip bud.

 

[chickenlittle]

http://articles.extension.org/pages/60833/apple-tree-propagation:-budding

 

[yoderjac]

I had only seen it done with actively growing budwood in mid summer. How about the rootstock, can it still be green or does it need to be hardened off? In the examples I've seen, they seem to rely on bark peel.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[chickenlittle]

You are thinking of T-budding. T-budding needs to be when the bark is slipping. You need to peel back the bark and slide the budwood in behind. You also slip the budwood off the stick before sliding it into the T on the rootstock.

Chip budding is similar but different. Chip budding has no requirement for the bark to slip. You cut a notch into the rootstock and cut a matching chip with the bud. It goes into the notch so the cambium lines up. As long as you can cut a notch into the green seedling without damaging the cambium too much, it should work just fine. Just depends on how delicate the seedlings are. You can practice chip budding now on your dormant rootstocks. You could even add a chip bud below your whip&tongue or cleft grafts to get another chance at a take.

 

[chickenlittle]

 

[yoderjac]

You are thinking of T-budding. T-budding needs to be when the bark is slipping. You need to peel back the bark and slide the budwood in behind. You also slip the budwood off the stick before sliding it into the T on the rootstock.

Chip budding is similar but different. Chip budding has no requirement for the bark to slip. You cut a notch into the rootstock and cut a matching chip with the dormant bud. It goes into the notch so the cambium lines up. As long as you can cut a notch into the green seedling without damaging the cambium too much, it should work just fine. Just depends on how delicate the seedlings are. You can practice chip budding now on your dormant rootstocks. You could even add a chip bud below your whip&tongue or cleft grafts to get another chance at a take.

Thanks. I think I'll give it a whirl. Nice video. I was thinking of doing it with some of these:

The picture is a week old so they have grown since then. I'll probably wait until they get a bit larger, but if they are this big now, they should be pretty big in a month. The video shows it down on dormant root stock. I'd love to see an example of it done on green actively growing rootstock like this if you happen to know of any.

I think with T-budding you usually have to wait until the following spring for the bud to grow. I'm presuming with chip budding you don't.

Thanks again,

Jack

 

[chickenlittle]

I don't think you'll find an example of exactly what you want to do. I have used some fairly green budwood for t-budding. It is fragile and prone to tearing and can be hard to get off the budwood stick. I used it because it was the best I had and I did not track success. I would think your biggest challenge is cutting the notch in young wood. It will be easy to cut through it or break it. But if you can get the chip bud on and remove the stock above it, it will have to push the bud to survive. You may find it is easier to wait until later. Chip budding in may or june could still achieve some nice growth. Late summer T-budding or chip budding won't push much growth and usually stays dormant. I've gotten up to 6" from a T-bud in the fall but I don't cut the stock off above the bud until I see it pushing growth the following spring. Growth from T-buds the next year has been impressive .

 

[Jhoss]

Here in SE Michigan I T-bud in late July approximately. You will see growth on the bud a month or two later / clear sign that you have a "take". And the next spring cut off all growth except the new bud. Here some pictorial inspiration.

 

[yoderjac]

Well, I started chip budding last night. I kind of like it. I haven't taken any pictures yet but I will. It actually seemed to work quite well. The apple seedlings grew so fast they can not support themselves. Even with the wire flags as support they want to flop over. So, cutting them back will be good in that aspect. Those I've grafted so far were well more than pencil diameter at the base. I cut most off at about 10". I removed leaves just below the cut-off point so I had 5 or 6 inches of leader to work with. They are green but starting to harden pretty well. I used buds from the dormant GRIN scions I received. I did 2 or 3 chip buds at different heights going around the leader. My intent is only to keep one, but wanted to maximize the chance of one taking since this is my first try. I also removed the lower leaves. I kept about 3 or so leaves not too far below the lowest chip bud to help keep the root system going. I used a single piece of Parafilm-M starting below the lowest bud and just covered the entire leader going over top of all the chip buds clear to the top. They are all in 1 gal RB2s right now. As soon as I see the buds taking, I'll transplant them to 3 gal RB2s.

Do you think it was a good idea to leave a few leaves below the chip-buds?

Do you think I removed too many leaves or not enough?

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

I grafted a few more today and took some pics:

Original seedling

Seedling cut off with leaves removed for grafting

The final tree after chip budding and applying parafilm-M.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[chickenlittle]

Looks good. Looking forward to seeing how well it works on such a young tree.

 

[yoderjac]

That is my concern as well. It is a pretty small root system that has just pushed a big section of top growth. That is one reason I'm leaving the nurse leaves. I figure if the grafts don't take, I'll get a branch that can become the central leader. If they do take, this method will save me a lot. I'll be planting trees from 3 gal RB2s that don't need to recover from the set-back of grafting next spring. I won't be doing all my seedlings this way, but I figured I'd try with the most vigorous. I'll probably graft a few more this week and then sit back and wait and watch. If I see encouraging signs with this first set, I'll try it on more.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

Some folks suggested that it was a bad idea to remove more than 1/3 of the top and that I should keep leaves above the graft. So, I tried a few with those suggestions tonight. Here is the first:

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

I chip budded a few more seedlings tonight. This time, I tried a couple where I did not remove the top 1/3 of the tree. I just left the entire seedling intact removing only a few leaves in the area where I budded.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

Looks like one might be starting to take:

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

My overall success rate does not look real good, at least not yet. So far, it seems I had best success when the trees were heavily cut back at grafting time verses the trees I just took the top third off and the leave around where I grafted. So far none of those show promise. From the trees that were severely cut back, I have a few that show promise. Here are the best two:

They were recently transplanted to the 3 gal RB2s.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[chickenlittle]

I would think cutting them back would be the better approach. The other suggestion you got seemed weird to me. Either way, you are pushing the envelope to get scion growth this year.