Thread: Fruit, Nut, and Vine Grafting, Tree Propagation, Tree Care

Very cool

I thought I was doing something when I bought the stuff to root some catalpa worms tree shoots.

Originally Posted by DockShootinJack

I thought I was doing something when I bought the stuff to root some catalpa worms tree shoots.

You're laughing but let me tell you about The Great Catalpa Caper. My wife's son went to Lambuth in Jackson, TN. He played football all 4 years there so we drove up for the home games when we could. On I-55 around Grenada was a drainage ditch perpendicular to the Interstate. It was full of young Catalpa trees. On one of the trips back I stopped, ran down in the ditch, ripped a couple dozen trees out of the sandy spots, ran back to the truck and wrapped the roots in wet newspaper, then continued home. After planting and getting them up 10-12ft I allowing the worms to start stripping the leaves. I would get a few crops of worm every year that I let raise in the ground thinking the crops would get more plentiful. Well no, they got less and less till none for a few years. I don't know how to grow worms but had beautiful trees till I finally cut them down.

All across the South are Mayhaw trees, a member of the Hawthorn family. Their taste is like a wild, tart Crabapple. As the fruit develops it looks like little apples. We go out in the Pearl River Swamp when the fruit starts to ripen, shaking the limbs hanging over water so the fruit drops in. Since it floats we just dip it up with a minnow net. I had a spider drop down in my shirt and bite me on the side on one of these trips causing my to loose all smell and taste for a long time. We never identified the 8 Legged Freak spider but by the hole left in me you knew what did it. Anyway as written above Mayhaws just shake free, ripening over quite a few days, so you have to revisit the tree to collect most of the fruit. The technical term is "Shatter". If your Mayhaw Shatters it does not hold the fruit once ripened it falls to the ground. Mayhaws are harvested like pecans, big Vibrators shake the tree and the fruit falls onto tarps that are used to pick all the little fruits up.



This tree I Topworked end of last Winter to Maxine. Maxine is a Mayhaw that friut size is .80in, blooms several weeks later missing late frosts in most cases, does not Shatter so I can harvest 90% of the fruit at one time, and has a better taste. I bought one Maxine for the source scion wood, have grafted several trees over here. The first picture you can see a overall view of this first year's growth. I think I put around 20 grafts on this one (only 1 didn't take). Second and third pictures are closeups of a few grafts.



This Mayhaw Topwork job is in its 3rd year of growth, last year we harvested a 5 gallon bucket of fruit. I was hoping to get another this year but the late freeze killed all the fruit. Not fruiting this year it will be loaded next year so I should get enough for a little batch of wine. Numerous "shoots" are popping up from the roots, these will be air layered to propagate into new rootstocks for this Fall's planting.

How do you know what you should use for graft and the host? Is there an ideal size for this or just new growth?

Originally Posted by SuperDave336

How do you know what you should use for graft and the host? Is there an ideal size for this or just new growth?

Yes, pencil size works well but I have grafted as small as 1/8in diameter with near 100% success. You always use first year growth wood for a scion to graft to the root. I don't know if second year old bark will take well, never tried it.

Are you using different varieties for the graft or just new cuttings? I'm sort of confused

Originally Posted by SuperDave336

Are you using different varieties for the graft or just new cuttings? I'm sort of confused

You have to stay in the same family. Almost any Hawthorne can be grafted to any other Hawthorne. Any pecan can be grafted to any other Pecan. The interesting stuff starts with fruit trees. You can make 20+ variety fruit trees, you just get a few of each fruit that way. When pollinators are needed you can graft a pollinator limb right in the middle of the desired fruit tree. As it blooms and the bees do their thing they don't need to go from tree to tree, just limb to limb. If the two limbs are not directly compatible a piece of whats called "Interstock" can be grafted first then the desired fruit is grafted to the Interstock. This is how "Fruit Cocktail" trees are made.