[Sca-cooks] RE: A trick for growing period apple

[Jeff.Gedney at dictaphone.com]

Cariadoc hath writ:
> Can you recommend a good source for information on how to do it?


Raintree Nursery has everything almost you might need, except, it seems
"budding and grafting wax". -- though food grade "Jelly Jar" parrafin
(Brits take note: this is not what you all call Parrafin, we call that
that stuff "kerosene") seems work just fine for this use.
http://www.raintreenursery.com/

They even sell a pretty good pamphlet on the process.

I'd recommend that the Poster who wanted to find Apple Rootstock Consider
the "EMLA 27" variety. This is a lousy eating apple, but does well
supporting grafts. The main advantage is that it never grows more than 15
gfeet or so high, making picking easy.

You just have to remove the "suckers" (those branches that come off the
ungrafted stock) as they form.

Prices are OK, too.

> We have what was a young two on one dwarf peach tree. At some point,
> I think when someone was doing yard work for us, the branches got
> broken off. At the moment one is coming back--but we also have shoots
> coming up from the root stock. It occurred to me that it might be fun
> to let one of the shoots grow into a second trunk, then graft on to
> that.

You might want to consider that the peach might have been a grafted dwarf
in the first place. Leave at least one of the trunk "suckers" and the
regrowing branch for a year or so, then compare the flowers and fruits. If
they are different, the tree is a grafted larger variety onto the dwarf
rootstock. You can, of course use the new branches as a stock, and then
get some nice "Scionwood" by cutting some small prunings from the "good"
branches which are growing out form the break, and thus, with a little
creative pruning and grafting, repair the previous look of the tree.

Brandu
-I have, on my property, a prolific "squeezin" crabapple of a variety that
I have never seen anywhere before, that is slowly dying from overgrowth,
Wind damage and insect, that  I am desparately trying to save. It seems to be very reluctant to sprout from the seeds, so grafting and
rooting are my two choices. So far it seems resistant to my attempts at
grafting, but I am still rather a novice at the practice, and this takes
skill, and a VERY sharp knife.