Quote:
Originally Posted by txtstorm
I'm a complete newb with grafting. I started my 2nd round of seeds this past weekend. I just finished one practice round with some texas wild cherry and brandywine seeds I had started in early December. It failed miserably. Not one of them took.
This next round I've got Supernatural and Sungold as rootstocks and a Black Krim and some others for scions. I'm hoping to be able to control the growth of one or the other by regulating the amount of light and/or temperature.
I'm using an aquarium 1/4 full of water with an aquarium heater to control the humidity and temperature. I float the plants on a piece of foam and cover the top.
What I can't figure out is when to start exposing the plants to light and when to start backing off on the humidity.
I sure hope I can get even just a few to take. I've been reading Delerium's threads and his methods look different from what I'm seeing at some of '.edu' tutorials I find. I think I might give the no roots grafting a try.
Best,
Adam
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I have tried both and found a compromise in the middle that works better for me. I rip off most of the roots of the rootstock before grafting. When I make my grafting cut I lay the scion and root stock side by side and match the stems and make a diagonal cut through both at the same time then clip them together with a silicon clip. I then fill a small Styrofoam coffee cup with medium grain DE then give it a drink to wet the DE and let it drain. Then I take my finger or a pencil and make a hole then set the grafted plant in it and push the DE back against the stem at just slightly deeper than the original depth and then put some dry medium grain DE around the stem so it is supported better and isn't in contact with the wet DE. After potting it into the DE I hold it up to a bright light to make sure the stems are perfectly matched. Doing this will save you a lot of heartache and you will be surprised how many times you see the light coming through where they are joined meaning it isn't a clean meeting of the two stems.
Before I make my cut I trim most of the top off the scion because if it wilts too much the heavy weight of the leaves can cause the juncture of the graft to pull apart. I just leave a very small amount of foliage on the scion. I then place it in a plastic clear tote that can be closed and put it in a place where it is cool and leave it for two days. I then open it wide and let air in it for about 5 minutes then close it back and repeat this for a couple of days increasing the number of times I let in air. After 5 to 7 days from starting I leave the top cracked for another day or two then just totally remove the top and water the plants with a mild solution of liquid fertilizer. There will still be some wilting and some may fail but with time most of them will perk up and can be moved into more direct sunlight at that time. I never put mine in total darkness but do make sure they are well shaded for at least the first few days after grafting.
Once they are growing good I repot them in potting soil and place a skewer beside each one to make sure they don't fall over. I then gradually move them back into direct sunlight and after a few days expose them to wind. I do not remove the grafting clips until the day or two before planting if they look totally healed or I just let the growing plant pop it off. When I set them out in the garden they are well hardened off because of the length of time I wait before setting them out but I still clip them to my support string immediately to prevent wind from shearing them off at the graft juncture. It takes longer than you might think before that healed juncture is strong enough to withstand strong winds without some of them breaking apart. I learned the hard way that it is better to wait an extra week or two than rush setting out grafted plants too early in the spring weather.
From the look of my seedlings I will be starting my grafting in a week or two. I will start with the largest and do as many as are large enough to graft then wait a few days and do more when an adequate number are ready. I always start a new healing chamber for each batch. I also label the date so I know how long they have been in the chamber. I have found the longer you can leave them in the chambers the better as long as you don't have problems with too damp conditions starting damping off type problems. I only mist the top lid before closing the chamber and keep it closed between grafts so the plants are not exposed to the open any longer than possible after grafting. I will usually do two grafts put them in the chamber, close it then do two more til I run out of plants or fill the chamber which holds about 25. When I am ready to seal it I mist the top of the lid again and seal it.
The reason I use DE for starting seed and potting the grafted plants to go into the chamber is that using it instead of a potting mix greatly reduces the incidence of damping off of the stem either where it is going into the potting mix or at the graft juncture. It helps to reduce the amount of roots because it retards the root stock from sucking up too much moisture forcing the juncture to separate inside the clip. For that reason I try not to water my root stock for two days before grafting. You don't want them wilting but you don't want the root stock stem to be full of water either. On the scion I make sure they are well watered a few hours before grafting to lessen the wilting which will come while the juncture starts to heal.
I get the small DE for starting my seedlings at Auto Zone and the medium DE at O'Reilly auto parts. I dump the larger DE into a clean bucket for reuse when I go to repot them with potting soil to save a bit of money.
Since getting this technique down my success rate has been well over 90% overall but there will be times when for no reason that I can tell up to a third of them can fail. Before I went to using the DE and this system I would sometimes lose all but a couple of plants and rarely got better than 60% success. With all the time and effort grafting takes it is worth spending a little bit more on the DE. In areas where damping off isn't as common a problem as it is here it might not make as big a difference but it should allow you to leave the newly grafted plants in the healing chamber longer.
If it gets too hot and dry then the plants usually need more time to heal because of the lose of moisture from the scion which can slow the healing. If it is too cool that can also slow the healing. I find that somewhere that is comfortable for people works best for me so if it is too cold I move my healing chambers into the house or if it is too hot I set them on the floor of my tiny air conditioned greenhouse. If the temperature is moderate and it is raining every day with 100% humidity I open the lid and set my chambers on my porch and just leave the lids off unless the rain stops too soon. The plants seem to do great when that happens but that is not an ordinary circumstance but I have done it with several batches with near 100% success even when done the first day. If you do this and they start wilting badly you can always close them back up but it is rarely necessary.
Hope this helps you.
Bill