2017 Grafting thread: Open to all

[BigVanVader]

Well good news. I have been opening my healing chamber all week and yesterday I decided that it was live or die time. and removed the plants from the chamber, so far they look fine and it looks like they will all make it. I did notice one of the plants cuts didnt get lined up well so I don't know if I will use it regardless. My 7 newer grafts all look fine still and I think they should probably heal faster. I left most of the roots on a couple and so far no separation. I have been sticking the tops of my rootstock in DE to root and so far have only lost 1. I didn't even put them in the healing chamber just misted with water every day. If all of my 12 grafts live I'm going to be very happy plus getting to use the tops a second time is great.

[Fritz77]

Originally Posted by 5haun5

I'd just like to thank everyone for sharing. I've so far been unable to get rootstock seeds here in New Zealand* but bought a badly-grafted tomato plant two years ago, grafted on Maxifort. The scion died and the Maxifort grew instead.

I've been keeping that one Maxifort plant alive ever since, taking cuttings and rooting them for use with side-grafting other scions with good success (and taking cuttings to serve as the new 'mother plant' as each gets too big to manage).

* It seems that today I may have finally sourced a manageable amount of rootstock seeds. Up until now suppliers say they only sell wholesale in lots of 10,000 but I found a supplier who has small 100 seed trial packs of DRO141TX that he's been selling to commercial nurseries trying to get them to change their rootstock. He said he'll let me have one for cost, NZ$38.60 plus tax plus shipping. Yay!

So it seems I might finally be able to attempt top grafting. I don't have the clips and have looked several times in several places over the last few years for them. Oh I can buy them but they also only come in lots of 10,000 - all one size. Hobbyist grafting hasn't taken off here yet.

I'm still awaiting payment instructions from the De Ruiter agent for the DRO141TX seeds but am hopeful the deal will go through. Then as it's late summer here I'll just have to wait about 6 months or so...

Cheers,
Shaun.

It seems like finding seeds for a supposed good rootstock is a lot easier in the U.S. than in the rest of the world. After searching for a while, I finally found a French site that sells rootstocks also to privates and not only to campanies/nurseries. Here is the link in case some of you Europeans are into this challenge but are going through the same struggle. I bought their F1 Groundforce which is nematodes, verticillium, fusarium root, corky root, Corynebacterium resistant.

http://www.tomatobomo.com/en/recherc...submit_search=

25 seeds for € 5,40 is a fair deal (0,22 cents per seed). Shipping costs are a flat € 2,00 so I added some seeds of a couple of varieties I had been looking for (Armenian, Tegucigalpa) and should be enough considering that this is an experiment and that by the way my garden is pretty small.
I’m planning on using this rootstock to improve the size and the yields of some varieties that are supposed to be not so productive (Noire Charbonneise, Dr. Lyle and Slankard’s for example).
To fight BER which affected basically all of the few paste tomatoes I had last year, I will use another rootstock. It’s called Franchi Scipio F1 (BER, VERT, FUS resistant). It’s not sold for this purpose but I’ll give it a try. If it doesn’t work…..never mind.

[Fritz77]

Originally Posted by 5haun5

Hi Fritz,

I haven't tried tube grafting yet but I use the red clips for side grafting (or approach grafting) with good success. I also have some of those last clips and may try those for tube grafting as I can't get the clips that everyone else is using either.

Oh, I found that the last clips have a moulding seam all around but also inside right where the rootstock and scion meet that can intrude into the gap quite a lot. I slipped one around a Dremel spiral cutting tool to trim the flashing out but it didn't work as well as I'd hoped.

Cheers,
Shaun.

I've watched a video about side grafting on Youtube and it seems even more difficult, maybe too difficult for a newbie like me.
I finally purchased the red clips but I should probably get myself a second type of a different size as everybody is suggesting that.
However thanks for your tip.

Dami

Originally Posted by Father'sDaughter

Wow, that is a brilliant idea if you're able to keep the plant going year-round and aren't planning on a large number of plants! Not to mention all the money you could save by not having to buy so much rootstock seed every year.

A question -- is there a reason you can't use your rooted cuttings to top graft with? You mentioned having to wait to get the new rootstock seed to be able to try top grafting, so I'm just curious about the reason why.

I've tried top grafting onto my rooted cuttings but they are so vigorous they are too large a diameter to topgraft successfully - at least for me so far. Even a short cutting has a stem diameter more than double that of a seedling and it seems that the older the seedlings are the harder they are to topgraft.

Side grafting is a different story however and I'm pleased to say that this year 100% of my grafts took and I have plants bearing fruit with double leaders 3m long

Originally Posted by Fritz77

I've watched a video about side grafting on Youtube and it seems even more difficult, maybe too difficult for a newbie like me.
I finally purchased the red clips but I should probably get myself a second type of a different size as everybody is suggesting that.
However thanks for your tip.

Dami

I don't know about 'even more difficult'. I've had good success with it using those red clips. Heck this spring I even had all three grafts that I tried outside take! I had a 'mother plant' Maxifort that had got too big so, having seen how it grows roots out of it's branches wherever it touches the ground, I planted it in the vege patch sideways and pegged the branches down into the dirt. As soon as three reasonably spaced growing tips started growing upwards again I grafted onto them. Once they 'took' I cut off all of the Maxifort vegetative growth and removed the potted scion roots. Now I have three huge plants all sharing the same massive root system!

If I can side graft outside, just using those red clips and some plywood squares to shade the grafts from the midday heat then you might want to try it yourself - what have you got to lose?

Granted it's easier to do in a semi-controlled environment. I just put the two plants into the same pot after making the graft then cover it with a plastic bag (with a wire hoop for support) and put them in the shade for a week or two, bottom-watering from the third day.

Good luck whatever you try.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by Father'sDaughter

Wow, that is a brilliant idea if you're able to keep the plant going year-round and aren't planning on a large number of plants! Not to mention all the money you could save by not having to buy so much rootstock seed every year.

A question -- is there a reason you can't use your rooted cuttings to top graft with? You mentioned having to wait to get the new rootstock seed to be able to try top grafting, so I'm just curious about the reason why.

I do it when I have large enough tops from my root stock to root; but it is trickier because you only have a short time from the time roots take hold til the stem gets large or more woody. The older stems don't take grafts as well but they will take often enough for it to be worth doing. I used a few yesterday when I ran out of root stock seedlings.

another problem with continually rooting root stock is the plant will eventually develop diseases and pests like aphids. It is easier to use the young seedlings from seed as they are more consistent in size and more tender thus taking grafts better.
I bought 500 RST-04-106-T seeds for a little more than a 100 dollars since I had good luck with germinating the old seed from last year. At 20 cents a seed the cost is not so prohibitive and I can afford to plant more to assure a decent stand each time. I'm sure as the use of root stock for grafting increases the cost of seeds will eventually come down as they already have. Buying very small quantities is still ridiculously expensive with some vendors I have noticed when browsing seed sites.

Bill

[b54red]

Originally Posted by BigVanVader

Well good news. I have been opening my healing chamber all week and yesterday I decided that it was live or die time. and removed the plants from the chamber, so far they look fine and it looks like they will all make it. I did notice one of the plants cuts didnt get lined up well so I don't know if I will use it regardless. My 7 newer grafts all look fine still and I think they should probably heal faster. I left most of the roots on a couple and so far no separation. I have been sticking the tops of my rootstock in DE to root and so far have only lost 1. I didn't even put them in the healing chamber just misted with water every day. If all of my 12 grafts live I'm going to be very happy plus getting to use the tops a second time is great.

Congratulations. Now that you know a bit about what you are doing it will just get easier to be successful. So far out of my first 100 grafts I have had two failures but getting too leisurely with it can cause some bad accidents that can cause failure of grafts. Yesterday I went out into the greenhouse and opened up the batch of grafts I did on the 12th just to give them a good airing and then I intended to replace the lid with a nice little crack. I got distracted and walked out and forgot to replace the lid. Since it was overcast I didn't turn on the air conditioner and didn't go back into the greenhouse til nearly 3 pm when it got really sunny and found a whole chamber full of wilted grafts. I misted them and watered each cup a bit and then put the lid on and put them in the shadiest place in the greenhouse and turned on the air conditioner. I checked them this morning and a good many of them have perked up but I think my over 90% success rate is going to take a big hit with that batch.

Bill

Originally Posted by b54red

... another problem with continually rooting root stock is the plant will eventually develop diseases and pests like aphids.

Oddly I have never seen aphids on Maxifort - even when it was rootbound in a small pot outside over winter during frosts - during the 28 months I've kept this plant going. I've never seen Whitefly or caterpillars on it either, even during times when I've seen both on my other plants. I think it's smell keeps them away.

Even if I did get pests though it wouldn't be hard to take the healthiest growing tip, remove any infestation and re-start the plant. I'm not saying it's better than how you graft by any means - that's why I'm taking in all of your generously shared information and why I'm ordering rootstock seeds. I just mention it as it enabled me to have healthy grafted plants* for two seasons when I couldn't otherwise access rootstock.
[*] I like my plants grafted as I can get by most summers without having to water them (other than maybe three times over a week if it's dry after first planting out) due to the large and vigorous root systems. No watering not only means less work but also less fungal-type issues, less Whitefly for some reason and, last but certainly not least, far fewer weeds.

At least that has been my experience to date, granted only with Maxifort and a couple of scion types.

Shaun.

[bitterwort]

BVV, I wouldn't worry about the one that didn't go on quite straight. Once they start actively growing after they head, the plant more than makes up for it. By end of season even here, the stems all look like trees, regardless of whether they were perfectly straight to begin with.

[Gardeneer]

Bad News : I have sadly to report a 100% failure rate.

My lone graft died of KNOWN cause : Root stock damping off or a BAD contact, me thinks.
The scion was trying to make a joint but the root stock did not co operate.
The scion tried hard to hang in there for 9 days.
A close autopsy of the root stock showed a healthy root system.

I am growing more Big Beef , as RS, to try again.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by Gardeneer

Bad News : I have sadly to report a 100% failure rate.

My lone graft died of KNOWN cause : Root stock damping off or a BAD contact, me thinks.
The scion was trying to make a joint but the root stock did not co operate.
The scion tried hard to hang in there for 9 days.
A close autopsy of the root stock showed a healthy root system.

I am growing more Big Beef , as RS, to try again.

Did you remove most of the roots on the root stock before grafting?

Bill

[Father'sDaughter]

Originally Posted by b54red

Did you remove most of the roots on the root stock before grafting?



Bill

In an earlier post he said he did not, which is concerning me because this is what I am considering trying.

So I read back through the older posts on this plant's progression. Looks like it came out of the healing chamber on day six or seven. Do you think maybe it wasn't in there long enough?

[BigVanVader]

The thing that seemed to make or break my success was removing the cover to ween them off the humidity. Mine would wilt badly in 30 mins or so at first, but over time I could go 2-3 hours then overnight then finally 24 hours before deciding that they were ready. Even then a couple were slightly wilted but I left them out anyway and now they are under the lights and doing well.

[BigVanVader]

Originally Posted by b54red

Congratulations. Now that you know a bit about what you are doing it will just get easier to be successful. So far out of my first 100 grafts I have had two failures but getting too leisurely with it can cause some bad accidents that can cause failure of grafts. Yesterday I went out into the greenhouse and opened up the batch of grafts I did on the 12th just to give them a good airing and then I intended to replace the lid with a nice little crack. I got distracted and walked out and forgot to replace the lid. Since it was overcast I didn't turn on the air conditioner and didn't go back into the greenhouse til nearly 3 pm when it got really sunny and found a whole chamber full of wilted grafts. I misted them and watered each cup a bit and then put the lid on and put them in the shadiest place in the greenhouse and turned on the air conditioner. I checked them this morning and a good many of them have perked up but I think my over 90% success rate is going to take a big hit with that batch.

Bill

Thanks Bill, for everything. Sorry to hear about your new batch. Luckily you have plenty for yourself already. I have a bunch of Big Beef to graft this weeken while I wait for my next tray of RST to get ready.

[Gardeneer]

Originally Posted by b54red

Did you remove most of the roots on the root stock before grafting?

Bill

No I did not.
As I have said before , I did not remove the RS from its pot and grafted right onto it.
You live and learn.
Experience is another name for our mistakes.
But there is always another time.