I took the scionwood that Viron found on an old Gravenstein tree and graciously shipped to me and decided to add it to the top of my Gravenstein tree. I used the method called bark grafting and made a website to show what I did. Comments and critiques welcome. Sharing your experiences can only be beneficial to us all. I'd like to thank Viron for his willingness to share his knowledge, experience and scionwood!
http://home.comcast.net/~gkowen/grafting/barkgraft2.htm
[url:13ht4f4l]http://home.comcast.net/~gkowen/grafting/barkgraft2.htm[/url:13ht4f4l]
yes it is a Victorinox. I am just learning how to use it. I can make nice clean cuts for whip grafting but getting that tongue cut right so that the parts line up is still eluding me. Also, being able to get the tongues open so they 'hook' together doesn't work well for me. I need more practice. My pruning pile is getting smaller because I keep practicing.
Greg, keep practicing on those tongue alignments; it's all in the offset. (As I mumble to myself while grafting) “two fifths down from the tip†of the scion make the tongue cut ... and as you back your knife out, give a gentile-but-firm 'lift' at the tongue edge. Just enough to flair it up some, on both tongues -- and they'll usually 'grab' nicely as you slide them across each other. I actually joked about doing one with my eyes closed, just feeling my way through it -- untill I felt blood.. If you don't flair the tongues, you can also press the tips together to 'open' up the notches as you slide them together. But that's tricky... nothing freaks out a grafting client more (other than blood) than to watch you snap their scion (the rootstock's generally stronger). If there's plenty of scion wood, no problem ... just flair the edges next time.
I hope everyone interested picked up on your example of leaving the scions 'long,' until you've finished placing them on the stock (if you’ve plenty of scion wood). If you make a mistake, you can simply start another cut a couple buds back. And it's a lot easier to make those trickyer cuts with more to hold onto than a two bud stick.
....Hey... If you feel comfortable with your bench grafting abilities, we're always in need of more Grafters at our crazy exchange. In fact (if the drive's not too far), having our grafting classes at Clackamas Community College (near Oregon City & extremely easy to reach from I-205) two weeks prior to the Exchange is a great time to get into the grafting groove by working with our students; picking up pointers from the rest of us; or hanging out in another area working with a master grafter putting together our make-a-tree orders. And.... as our friend and Grafting Mentor, Wayne Huffstuter is no longer rounding us grafters up , or able to give his wonderful Top Working demonstration at our event, you might help us out there too? If not yet an 'expert,' your enthusiasm and grasp of the basics would more than compensate ... and if you needed help with an answer - just holler over to one of us! …only don't expect the same answer...
Food for thought, it's a year away.
I'd love to attend and learn and help at these events but unfortunately my Saturdays are all taken up. If it was on a weekday or a Sunday I'd be there. I will practice the flair technique. My hands are sore. Haven't cut myself with the knife yet but have several gouges from the wood. I am getting better though. Problem is I have no more room for trees. Well after last nights 24 degrees, maybe I will get rid of all the early blossoming things. That will give me room.
I added an update after 1 month with a few more photos. The grafts are starting to leaf out. Here is the URL.
http://home.comcast.net/~gkowe.....graft2.htm
Its nice to see the proof that its working, or at least hasn't failed yet.
You did shorten the scions. There's a picture of you doing it from the orignal demo. You said you shorten them to 2 or 3 buds and that's what you have there.
I did some apple bark grafts at the beginning of this month and the buds are just starting to push on some of mine also. I was beginning to get impatient.
I tried a few different methods and unfortunately some of them didn't hold up very well. One of the ones that wasn't a good combination was ordinary rubberbands covered with Doc Farwell's. Those fell apart pretty quickly. Ordinary rubberbands do work fine if covered in parafilm though.
I tried my first cleft graft but I think it will fail because I didn't wrap it with a good method.
I've still got plenty of scion wood and 3/4 of the tree still to top work. It ends up taking a lot more time than I think it will. It probably took me a couple of hours to do less than 10 grafts.
Today, I decided it was time to shorten the scion length of the grafts. They are leafing well. I will take more pics in a couple weeks to see how it is going. It does seem that having 4 buds is too much. They all were leafing. Now I only have 1 or 2 buda leafing on each scion. I think this will do better. Last years grafts are growing well. About 6 feet tall and well leafed out.
Ok, one last update. They seem to be doing well. One is outgrowing the others but they will catch up. Thanks Viron for the excellent scionwood. You can look at the whole webpage by clicking here.
http://home.comcast.net/~gkowe.....graft2.htm
Or just see the latest photo here:
http://home.comcast.net/~gkowe.....2month.jpg
Greg
No, they are all green. It is just slower. When I cut them back a couple weeks ago, I smeared some black (tar?) grafting sealer on it. The buds have pushed right through the wax and the black sealer doesn't seem to bother the growth either. The warmer weather has helped their growth but 33 degrees last night had me worried.
Greg
Idyllwild
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Marsha H
Viron
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