Apple Grafting 1 - Spring 2025

 2025 Grafting and Planting Project 1

    In order to add pollenizer trees to the orchards on the West side of Ber-Nell Farm, we decided to fill in all of the holes where trees have had to be removed over the years (25 total).  These orchard have always had pollination difficulties since both of the varieties in the front 2.8 acres are triploid (meaning, infertile pollen). Figure 1 below shows the layout of the orchard and the proposed locations for the newly grafted trees.

Figure 1. West orchard replacement plan

    The numbers along the top and left hand side of the image indicate the type of tree in that orchard row (brown for golden supreme, yellow for golden delicious, and red for winesap) as well as the number of trees in that row.  For example, the red 21 immediately above the row that runs north-south on the easternmost edge of the orchard has 21 winesap trees.  Within the easternmost orchard block, where the rows run north-south instead of east-west, the missing tree locations are shown with lettered rectangles.  These correspond to newly grafted varieties as is shown in Table 1 along with other information about the variety.

Table 1. Diploid varieties to be added to the orchard block as pollination partners

    All information in the table came from the Cummin's Nursery website's information on that specific variety.  Varieties were chosen to give full coverage of the bloom season, but also for disease resistance and ability for the apples to store well.  I have never actually tasted any of these, but I look forward to trying each of them in the future.

    The trees were shipped on Monday 3/24/25 and arrived on Wednesday 3/26/25 late in the evening.  They were stored in the farmhouse garage overnight after adding a little water to the bag inside the box.  On Thursday morning 3/27/25, I retrieved the trees and set up my kitchen for grafting as is shown in Figures 2.  The rootstocks and scions after unboxing are shown in Figure 3.

Figure 2. Grafting setup materials

Figure 3. G.890 rootstocks (left) and all bundled scionwood (right).

Table 2. Grafting notes and ID numbers of the form 25G## 25 indicates the year (2025).  G indicates that it is a graft.  The last 2 numbers are the specific ID for that graft (the order in which they were done).

    Table 2 lists all the grafts there were done onto G.890.  The notes got a little spotty in the middle, but a rating of 9 means I noted that the graft union seemed especially good.  A 3 is normal and a 1 is poor.  I also noted when the graft union was offset and whether the roots were especially large or small.  Figure 4 shows the omega grafting process, while Figures 5-9 show the process of completing a whip and tongue (W&T) graft.

Figure 4. Omega graft (left) before joining, and after joining (right top - no offset, right bottom - with offset)

Figure 5. #25G02, Pristine onto G.890, rootstock cut for W&T

Figure 6. #25G02, rootstock tongue cut, note the undesirable crack.  The square wood is for cut protection while making the tongue cut towards the body.

Figure 7. #25G02, both W&T cuts before joining

Figure 8. #25G02, W&T graft after joining but before binding

Figure 9. #25G02, full view of grafted rootstock after joining and binding

    Before grafting, plants were stored in a bucket of water.  After a group of the same scions was finished, they were carefully tied together with twine (see Figure 10).  Bundles were then moved to a wetted mixture of wood chips and potting soil (Figure 11).  The wood chips were purchased that day from Tractor Supply (see Figure 12), although it is probably better and certainly cheaper to use composted chips or sawdust.

Figure 10. View of completed and grouped grafts #25G01-04

Figure 11. View of storage method of grafts #25G-01-07 for the callousing process.  Left image is before bucket was filled to top of the root surface area, right is after.  Fill was wood chips alternating with topsoil.

Figure 12. Wood chips used to heel in roots

    Completed grafts 25G01-25 were placed outside overnight (it was in the mid 40s that night), but moved inside for the next several days as outdoor temperatures were to fluctuate down to the 20s at night and apple grafts callous over best between 50 and 70 degrees F.