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Holding bare root fruit trees until planting
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Kathy
1 Posts
(Offline)
1
March 5, 2019 - 10:35 am

Hi, I'm planning to get some fruit trees grafted at the Fruit Propagation Fair on Sunday with scions from my Asian pear, flowering apricot, and Italian plum. Turns out I can't plant them immediately and it could be 3-4 weeks. What is the best way to hold them until I can plant (in SE Portland)? I'm new to growing fruit trees so thanks for any help.

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Rooney
Vancouver SW Washington
873 Posts
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2
March 5, 2019 - 9:45 pm

First you would have to study the paper order form they hand out to see which rootstocks are good for each fruit type. Double check at the help desk is always a good resource.

If you live local and still insist on grafting any apricot wood that you have not collected yet then you would have to pass on that until next year when you can collect apricot scionwood around January. Or hopefully one if the suppliers of apricots have stored apricot wood cold enough since January if they have the desired flower type you like. (Italian plum if not already collected is kind of chancy too) Then proceed to get them grafted together.

After treatment is the really easy advice to give you. For at least 3 weeks you could just almost place as many as you want in a 5 gallon bucket surrounded by a big clear garbage bag. At night you would close the top. Each middle of the day around noon you would open the top to vent out excess heat from direct sun. You can probably omit the latter on cloudy days.

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John S
PDX OR
3033 Posts
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3
March 6, 2019 - 9:06 pm

Yes, ROoney's bucket method works. Another option is to heel them in: dig a small trench and semi-plant them in it, so that the roots are covered and will remain moist.  You can replant them in a few weeks when you can.

John S
PDX OR

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