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Old October 28, 2018   #35
jtjmartin
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Join Date: May 2016
Location: Williamsburg VA Zone 7b
Posts: 1,110
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Hey All - A grafting update from southeast Virginia

Bacterial Wilt:
All but one or two of my grafted plants thrived and survived - many producing vines well over 20 feet long use single stem lean and lower. The couple that I had to pull early had that same stunted curled leaf look of herbicide damage or one of the myriad of diseases.

I extended my garden into some virgin land and hoped non-grafted tomatoes would grow there for at least a year or so. That was a no-go. Bacterial wilt even took out the hybrids like Brandy Boy just as they were producing. The BW is very hit and miss - a few non-grafted plants had a fairly long, productive year.

Grafting onto re-rooted RST-04-106:
As Bill observed above (thank you Bill for all your help & guidance) I had a very low success rate and noticed the difference in how fibrous the re-rooted tops were. I won't try this again unless forced to by lack of RST seed.

Zendog:
Hope to get an update from you on how your grafting is going. I'm in Arlington every other month or so on business. Pretty area.

Father's Daughter:
Grafting is a game-changer like you said! I grew a couple varieties that others said had great taste but were too susceptible to disease. Grafting worked! - great taste/little disease.

For next year, I just finished another 60 feet of hugel beds to grow tomatoes on. I'm planning on buying some bigger healing boxes and grafting more tomatoes at the same time rather than trying smaller batches.

Jeff
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