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#1
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Grafting an old apple tree
Hello all,
We are moving house, and in our present garden is a very old gnarled apple tree which produces a heavy crop of large blue green apples which we harvest in November and use in late January through to late March when they go yellow and ripen. I would like to take this apple tree with us and have a couple of questions about grafting. All the pictures that I can find of grafting show the scion as a last years shoot, about as thick as or thicker than a pencil with shiny bark. Our tree does not have any like this. The new shoots are very spindly, or contorted with next years fruit buds. Which would we be best way to take scions from such a tree? Does the scion have to be last years wood, or would an older thicker branch be better? The garden at our new house is big enough for a small tree (the parent is about 5m high with a similar spread which would be too large). Which rootstock should I use for grafting, and where can I buy one from? We presently live in North Lincolnshire, and are moving to the Manchester area, so a supplier nearby either who we could go to talk to would be ideal. Thanks for any advice, Chris Potts |
#2
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Grafting an old apple tree
"Chris Potts" wrote in message
I would like to take this apple tree with us and have a couple of questions about grafting. All the pictures that I can find of grafting show the scion as a last years shoot, about as thick as or thicker than a pencil with shiny bark. Our tree does not have any like this. The new shoots are very spindly, or contorted with next years fruit buds. Which would we be best way to take scions from such a tree? Does the scion have to be last years wood, or would an older thicker branch be better? The garden at our new house is big enough for a small tree (the parent is about 5m high with a similar spread which would be too large). Which rootstock should I use for grafting, and where can I buy one from? We presently live in North Lincolnshire, and are moving to the Manchester area, so a supplier nearby either who we could go to talk to would be ideal. The grafting I've done (with supervision from someone who knew what they were doing) was onto seedling apple trees that grew in spots where I'd put "compost" (yeah I know "compost" is not supposed to have viable seds in it but mine does). I/we put on heaps of grafts on 2 such trees (maybe 20-30 grafts??? - around that number anyway) and all but 1 graft took so I don't think that the source tree is all that important so long as it's an apple (but maybe seedling apple trees are tougher - dunno). All the scions used for this grafting was the pencil sized green stuff you describe. Since you have no options with your tree, why don't you take a variety of different scions and if you don't have a tree in the new place big enough to use all the scions, buy a bigger tree or perhaps two? |
#3
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Grafting an old apple tree
Farm1 writes
"Chris Potts" wrote in message I would like to take this apple tree with us and have a couple of questions about grafting. All the pictures that I can find of grafting show the scion as a last years shoot, about as thick as or thicker than a pencil with shiny bark. Our tree does not have any like this. The new shoots are very spindly, or contorted with next years fruit buds. Which would we be best way to take scions from such a tree? Does the scion have to be last years wood, or would an older thicker branch be better? The garden at our new house is big enough for a small tree (the parent is about 5m high with a similar spread which would be too large). Which rootstock should I use for grafting, and where can I buy one from? We presently live in North Lincolnshire, and are moving to the Manchester area, so a supplier nearby either who we could go to talk to would be ideal. The grafting I've done (with supervision from someone who knew what they were doing) was onto seedling apple trees that grew in spots where I'd put "compost" (yeah I know "compost" is not supposed to have viable seds in it but mine does). I/we put on heaps of grafts on 2 such trees (maybe 20-30 grafts??? - around that number anyway) and all but 1 graft took so I don't think that the source tree is all that important so long as it's an apple (but maybe seedling apple trees are tougher - dunno). It matters in this case because the size of the tree is important - most grafting of apple trees is done to govern the size of the tree, using 'dwarfing' stock. I don't know where you would obtain rootstocks - presumably from a specialist fruit nursery. I've got rootstocks for grafting pears by taking cuttings of suckers from the rootstock of one of my pears. -- Kay |
#4
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Grafting an old apple tree
Chris Potts wrote:
..... All the pictures that I can find of grafting show the scion as a last years shoot, about as thick as or thicker than a pencil with shiny bark. Our tree does not have any like this. The new shoots are very spindly, or contorted with next years fruit buds. Which would we be best way to take scions from such a tree? Does the scion have to be last years wood, or would an older thicker branch be better? Most of the grafting I've done used the type of scions you describe from the books. You can encourage a tree to give such scions by very heavy winter pruning, then summer thinning. But you need a year in hand for that, it's too late in this case. I have successfully grafted using 2 year scion wood - though I've not got fruit yet. So I'd take some spindly stuff and some 2 year wood. The garden at our new house is big enough for a small tree (the parent is about 5m high with a similar spread which would be too large). Which rootstock should I use for grafting, and where can I buy one from? We presently live in North Lincolnshire, and are moving to the Manchester area, so a supplier nearby either who we could go to talk to would be ideal. I'd recommend M26 as a root stock. It seems to do pretty well in the North (I'm near Wakefield). I've bought bare rooted M26 root stock from Rogers of Pickering http://www.rvroger.co.uk/ And I've rooted "suckers" from the root stock of my apple trees (M25 mostly). Sorry I don't know any nearer to Manchester. |
#5
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Grafting an old apple tree
"K" wrote in message
Farm1 writes "Chris Potts" wrote in message I would like to take this apple tree with us and have a couple of questions about grafting. All the pictures that I can find of grafting show the scion as a last years shoot, about as thick as or thicker than a pencil with shiny bark. Our tree does not have any like this. The new shoots are very spindly, or contorted with next years fruit buds. Which would we be best way to take scions from such a tree? Does the scion have to be last years wood, or would an older thicker branch be better? The garden at our new house is big enough for a small tree (the parent is about 5m high with a similar spread which would be too large). Which rootstock should I use for grafting, and where can I buy one from? We presently live in North Lincolnshire, and are moving to the Manchester area, so a supplier nearby either who we could go to talk to would be ideal. The grafting I've done (with supervision from someone who knew what they were doing) was onto seedling apple trees that grew in spots where I'd put "compost" (yeah I know "compost" is not supposed to have viable seds in it but mine does). I/we put on heaps of grafts on 2 such trees (maybe 20-30 grafts??? - around that number anyway) and all but 1 graft took so I don't think that the source tree is all that important so long as it's an apple (but maybe seedling apple trees are tougher - dunno). It matters in this case because the size of the tree is important - most grafting of apple trees is done to govern the size of the tree, using 'dwarfing' stock. Thanks for clarifying that. Stupidly I had assumed that the OP would have the sense to find a suitable rootstock tree on which to do his grafts. I had assumed that since the OP wrote with some appearance of knowledge on the subject he would understand from what I wrote that any apple stock he could find would work given that I/we had used so many differnt scions to graft to two absolutely indiffernt trees. I'll try to be more careful in future. |
#6
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Grafting an old apple tree
Chris Potts
Grafting can be done with fine twiggy material, if often takes readily, just takes a little care to get them ro thicken up; it is best done with last years wood; budding can be done with older wood but that is not an option given your imenant move. The Northern Fruit Group runs a free grafting courss for members at RHS Garden Harlow Carr and in conjunction with the WI, at the Millenium orchard in Beverley. That is if you want to do it yourself. The fruit group have access to rootstocks. If you want details let me know. Alternatively if you want it done for you mail me off list and we can sort something out Regards Clifford Bawtry, Doncaster, South Yorkshire (South Yorkshire rep for the Northern Fruit Group) |
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