The Tropical Fruit Forum

Thanks Scott.   . Have a great weekend.

 I will keep the progress updated in 6-8 weeks.

I probably should have left the tops on, but the window of opportunity to graft here is so narrow, if these fail I will have to wait a year anyway so it doesnt really matter.  They will bush back out if the grafts fail. 

Im pretty confident the grafts will work though so hopefully not too many redos.  The failed grafts from last year had multiple smaller brwnches bushing out and for those i did 2-3 cleft grafts which should almost guarantee success. 

Im sure most people dont do their plantings this way.  Plant a field of seedlings then top work.  Most farms use container grafted plants.  But for me it seems easier to do this way even if it takes multiple tries, doesnt really matter.  The rootstock continues to grow even if a top work attempt is unsuccessful, I can pick up again the following winter.  I tried to stress this point to some people.  You are not wasting time letting rootstocks grow in ground for many years.  It really makes little difference if you top work them in 1, 2, 3 years.  The roots continue growing and once you top work them, the above ground portion always comes right back after 1 summer of growth.  The size of the rootsystem determines how fast the scion grows. 

those nabal plants look awesome.  great tree. 

i top worked 40 or so sharwils last week.  havent decided what to put in the new space.  maybe some cherimoyas and some avocados.

the cambium layer is there right below the bark.  I think theres cambium tissue on the bark and the wood when you do this and it should give maximum cambium contact area. 

but I could have it all wrong and it may end up being a big fail.  Time will tell.  Someone with more knowledge could give us better insight on this.

I am not at all an expert on grafting.  Just good enough to get lucky sometimes with the avocados.  they are definitely not as easy as some other types of trees. 

if the scion and rootstocks are the same or close in diameter I do a cleft and match one side really well instead of this type of graft. 

the peoples republic of california also granted me permission to burn an acre of brush.  So I did.  This will become a new block of trees.  Will have it planted out by summer. 

I dont know whats going on in Texas but the packages are taking 5,6,7 days for a 2-3 day priority service.

Just a PSA, shipments are not going well to TX.

it seems like you need to have the seeds buried in dirt a bit so when the plant pops up it can pull itself out of the seed. 

Others seem to have good success with fresh seeds.   You dont necessarily need to wait a year, just that Ive always used old seeds and know its not a problem.

Sometimes they are not always super round.  Mine are often shaped that way too.  It looks like its not that ripe though Carlos.

Young reed trees tend to drop the fruit early and not get super ripe u til the tree ages.  The loose seed is indication its not fully ripe.  The flesh will turn more yellow if you can get them to ha g longer. 

Zutano rootstocks work fine. 

Yeah I have those.  I can cut as many as you want i planted a ton of that.  Not a great time of year to start cuttings though u less its really warm there?

What you need to do to make the grafts more robust on any tree is cut back the ungrafted portion so that it has to also grow back with the new grafts.  If theres a big honking rest of the tree there to use all the energy, its not going to get distributed well to the graft. 

Also for what its worth, its way easier to do what you are doing while the trees are small.  Once the tree gets larger its even more difficult to multigraft or top work cherimoyas.