Grafting pineapple guava

[Solko]

Here is my final follow up on my feijoa grafting. It wasn't a full success, but I learned quite a few things.

We have had a terrible wet and cold spring, and then a pretty hot and dry summer. My plants are in pots and for a long time after I grafted them they remained dormant, because it was too cold. So I wasn't really taking notice of the fact that when it started to heat up they were in full sun and that they needed a bit more water then I gave them. Most grafts showed good signs of growth. In June I left for two weeks and all the small grafts dried out, because it was too hot and sunny. I think if I would have protected them with a bag, or if I would have put the plants in a shady spot, they would have had a better chance.

In any case, 13 of my 45 grafts survived, and those were all of the largest size - pencil size wood. Some were cleft grafted, the others whip and tongue and one side veneer graft took. The whip and tongue graft had a higher rate of success, I think because it increases the area that cambium contact can form.

So for next year I will:
- use pencil size wood,
- wait for the rootstock plants to come out of dormancy,
- use whip and tongue grafts,
- tie the graft tightly,
- protect the grafts that are in full sun and
- water the rootstock plants thoroughly throughout summer.

Here are some pictures of the successful grafts:

Cleft graft


Whip and tongue


Whip and tongue


Whip and tongue on the top and an side veneer graft lower on the lower right side of the same stem


Cleft graft on thicker wood - aligned only on one side - it healed fine


And another cleft on thicker wood



These are the failed grafts, the crazy thing is that on this particular plant underneath all the failed grafts it started to flower like crazy, so even while I didn't get the graft to take, I am still getting a lot of fruit!

[Pancrazio]

Thank you for your follow up.
To be completely honest, I’m a bit envious. But I'll try to treasure your esperience if i'm going to ever graft Feijoa anymore.

[nexxogen]

It's been many years since the last reply in this thread.

@Solko

Did you try grafting feijoa again the next year, as you announced? I started learning how to graft this year for the first time and I tried grafting feijoa before I read this thread. I had some pretty thin scionwood, so I tried bark grafting also. I see that it wasn't mentioned as an option here, so I wonder if that was a mistake or not.

[shaneatwell]

Don't know about bark grafting. But I've had pretty good success. Whip, cleft and saddle. Timing seems to be the biggest factor. Zero success in summer. Mostly successful in late winter/early spring.

[nexxogen]

I guess I got the timing right at least. Here where I live, this time of year definitely is early spring. We'll see how the grafts do. I only did a few since I only have one very small tree.

[nexxogen]

Update

Out of 6 or 7 grafts only 2 took. One Nazemetz and one Coolidge. The interesting thing is, they were doing nothing for at least 3 months or more and only then decided to take, after I had lost all hope.

[nexxogen]

I got some Albert's Pride and Albert's supreme scion wood from Fruitwood Nursery, and they are extremely thin. Can I even use this for grafting and what method would be suitable? I plan on doing side veneer but I'm not sure that these are thick enough for that.

[nexxogen]

Anyone?

[swincher]

Anyone?

I just got 7 scions (counting freebies) from Really Good Plants, and many were thicker than those but some were that thin. I ordered the "thin" option from the website, so I was expecting this size. I did cleft grafts for all of them. I didn't have any trouble finding matching sized branches to graft onto, but time will tell in terms of success rates. Here were a couple of them:



The scion on the right had a bit of a curve, but mostly they were straight and all were healthy and still soft enough they didn't give my grafting knife any trouble. This was the thickest one, which was almost big enough for the "thick" category:

[nexxogen]

The thing is, I had a pretty low success rate with cleft grafts, and I would not really want to graft onto small end branches like that as I would like to gradually replace the canopy of my small tree with improved cultivars. I've heard that the side veneer graft has given good results to some people. The possible explanation is that with that type of graft, you don't cut off the branch and the flowing sap can actually help with graft healing. I'm going to try a few side veneer and a few side bark grafts this year. Hopefully they will work.

[swincher]

The thing is, I had a pretty low success rate with cleft grafts, and I would not really want to graft onto small end branches like that as I would like to gradually replace the canopy of my small tree with improved cultivars. I've heard that the side veneer graft has given good results to some people. The possible explanation is that with that type of graft, you don't cut off the branch and the flowing sap can actually help with graft healing. I'm going to try a few side veneer and a few side bark grafts this year. Hopefully they will work.

That makes sense. My goal is to add multiple varieties to help with fruit set and to see which ones can handle my marginal climate, so that's why the branch tips rather than closer to the base.

I was going to do whip + tongue, but I was having trouble getting the first tongues to align because of the small size of the scion, so gave up and just did clefts because they are quick and easy. I'll know in a month or so if that was a bad idea!

[nexxogen]

Just so you know, my two grafts that took last year were doing nothing for at least 3 months and then all of a sudden decided to start growing. I had long given up hope at that point. I have no idea why they did that, but I'm not complaining. The point is, there's a chance that this might happen to you too, so don't give up hope too soon if nothing happens in a month.