Author Topic: Questions about top working mature Mountain Soursop  (Read 1303 times)

pineislander

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Questions about top working mature Mountain Soursop
« on: July 16, 2019, 06:20:44 PM »
Two years ago I planted six soursop trees. Now that they are fruiting I have discovered they are Mountain Soursop (Annona montana) instead of ordinay soursop (annona muricata). I should have been more discriminating but was not very well versed and the vendor wasn't fully honest. The trees are healthy but I would prefer the muricata for fruit. I have a source for plenty of scions from ordinary soursop and may be able to get some named varieties.

My question pertains to how to go about the project. My options seem to be to either cut the trees low and graft onto sprouts or cut low branches and graft onto sprouts coming from slightly higher up. It seems to me that the difference would be dealing with rootstock sprouts later on and maybe healing problems of a large cut trunk compared to cuts on smaller branches. I have already been removing low sprouts anyways but have seen several soursop trees which seemed to have trouble healing damaged branches.

If anyone has done this I'd be interested in any comment, and especially from Har(Guanabanus) and Adam(Flying Fox Fruits) who I see as knowledgeable in this. Here is a picture of a typical tree in the row. They are about 8-10 feet tall and 3 inches trunk diameter.


« Last Edit: July 16, 2019, 06:22:16 PM by pineislander »

Guanabanus

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Re: Questions about top working mature Mountain Soursop
« Reply #1 on: July 16, 2019, 10:38:52 PM »
I regard montana as a good root-stock, for several species, but I have no successes to report from top-work grafting onto established trees.  Most of my attempts were with a very distantly-related species, Asimina triloba.
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skhan

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Re: Questions about top working mature Mountain Soursop
« Reply #2 on: August 21, 2019, 01:57:06 PM »
I regard montana as a good root-stock, for several species, but I have no successes to report from top-work grafting onto established trees.  Most of my attempts were with a very distantly-related species, Asimina triloba.

What species do you think works best with Montana?

sahai1

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Re: Questions about top working mature Mountain Soursop
« Reply #3 on: August 21, 2019, 03:05:33 PM »
in the case you really want to remove all of parent tree, then best is to stump graft it, cleft or kerf, but like you said, maybe this tree won't respond well to either soursop scions or to being cut back to stump.  I have seen many annona saplings including soursop grow back after being wheedwhacked to the ground, so I would say they are pretty resilient.

pineislander

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Re: Questions about top working mature Mountain Soursop
« Reply #4 on: August 22, 2019, 07:35:54 AM »
I stumped them and they have quickly sprouted. Some sprouts are getting big enough to start topworking, and I plan to prepare scion wood by tipping and defoliating to stimulate dormant buds. I have access to several mature trees to get the material.