Tips on how to properly vaccinate apple trees

Fruit trees can and should be grafted. And grafting an apple tree is a great example of this. Thanks to this process, you can accelerate the fruiting process, successfully and efficiently use the territory of the garden, as well as grow valuable varieties on your site that are not adapted to the climatic conditions of your area. The article will help you figure out with the help of what and when to plant apple trees and how to correctly carry out this manipulation.

What is needed for grafting

The grafting of an apple tree by its technology resembles a surgical intervention. Of course, mistakes when grafting an apple tree are not fatal and will not lead to the death of the tree. However, hobby gardeners need to know when to plant apple trees and what they need to do.

Rules

When vaccinating apple trees, you should adhere to the following rules. First of all, it is important to closely monitor the rootstock buds. It is necessary that they stay in a state of winter sleep and in no case begin to awaken. The procedure should be carried out clean. Household tools used for grafting must be clean and dry. The stalk itself and the place where the vaccination will be located must be washed with cold, boiled water and dried with gauze napkins or a bandage.

The knife used to make the cuts must be made of high-quality sharp steel, since it will need to be cut at the level of plant cells. If it is blunt, the tree canals will simply be crumpled, nutrients will not be able to penetrate through them into the grafted chip and the scion will simply dry out. The optimal blade thickness should be at least 1.5 mm and not more than 2.5 mm.

There are 2 types of grafting knives: with a straight blade - copulating and budding - with a curved pointed tip. During the grafting process, it is necessary to control that the edges of the scion and rootstock coincide and are pressed together as tightly as possible. After all, it is along the cambial layers (cell border) that the fusion process will take place. The strapping around the graft should be made with soft materials that fit tightly around the cut. Thanks to the bandage, we fix the joint and prevent the cutting from drying out.

It is very convenient to vaccinate with a grafting pruner. Thanks to him, the entire vaccination process is simplified, and you will spend much less time. This pruner is a multifunctional tool. It can be used not only for the grafting procedure, but also for pruning branches. When using a grafting pruner, a scion and rootstock of the same diameter are usually used. Cuttings should have smooth bark. The technology of how to properly graft an apple tree comes down to 4 stages:

• cut on the rootstock;
• a cut is also made on the scion, but in the opposite shape;
• tightly combine the stock and the scion;
• the grafting site is wrapped with braid and treated with a garden varnish.

What to vaccinate for?

It will also be useful to know about what you can plant the apple tree on. After all, curious gardeners are trying to plant a pear, for example, on a mountain ash or irga. This, of course, is possible, just keep in mind that such a vaccine is short-lived. The growth of wood in these trees is uneven, and the thickness of the seedling is small. The tree will need support as it grows. Therefore, the optimal rootstock is the same plant as the scion branch.Although breeders do not stop there and expand their achievements in breeding work.

Quite often, the opposite situation occurs when a pear is grafted onto an apple tree. In such a situation, it is important to know how to plant a pear on an apple tree in order to get pears on this tree. The growth rate of wood in apple and pear is similar, so this grafting will be more durable. Therefore, there is a lot of information on how to plant a pear on an apple tree.

It also happens that incompatibility appears during grafting between different varieties. This can happen with a complete re-grafting of the apple tree, or if it is carried out directly into the crown of a mature or old tree. Everything can be explained simply, because each variety will have its own strength of growth and this will negatively affect the vaccination.

Experimenting with the question "what can you graft an apple tree on", keep in mind that a considerable period of time will pass between the grafting process and the beginning of fruiting of the grafted branch - 3, or even all 5 years.

For growing young seedlings, it is recommended to use those grown from seeds of the same species that you plan to plant. The exception is the seedlings of the Anisov or Antonovka varieties - they are compatible with almost all fruit varieties.

For grafting, you can easily grow wild on your own. Seeds are sown in garden beds in late October, early November. The seeds are taken from the varieties that grow in your area. This should be done in the fall, so that the seeds can undergo natural treatment with cold winter temperatures and sprout with the onset of spring.

Methods

In addition to the question of what an apple tree can be grafted on, the choice of method is also important. There are many methods and ways of grafting an apple tree. We will consider non-traditional ones: grafting an apple tree into the root and summer budding with a dormant bud.

Grafting an apple tree into the root

If you have a stalk of a curious interesting variety, but no suitable rootstock, you can use root grafting. The procedure is carried out both in spring and autumn. To do this, you need to pick up an instance in which one of the roots is located close to the surface and its thickness is not thinner than the diameter of the clothespin. Having found the desired process, then you can act in two ways:

• graft in place. In this case, we cut off the found root no closer than a meter from the trunk, set and fix it vertically (you can simply prop it up with something, for example, with a brick wrapped in rags so as not to damage the root), without digging it completely out of the ground. Prepare for grafting: rinse the rhizome with water, wipe dry. Next, we graft our stalk by the bark, wrap the place of grafting splitting with insulating tape, coat the stalk with garden varnish, sprinkle it with soil, water it, and enclose the place of growth with pegs. After a year, the young seedling can be separated from the uterine trunk and transplanted into a previously prepared place in the garden;
• vaccinate with a transplant. With this method, carefully dig out the cut root completely, then the actions are the same as in the first case, but the ready-made "collected" seedling is immediately planted in a permanent place of growth. Water, sprinkle with earth and mulch with leaves and humus.

Grafting an apple tree on a stock (budding)

Many gardeners, especially beginners, are interested in how to plant an apple tree and when is the best time for this. When asked when to plant apple trees, most gardeners answer that in spring. But budding or grafting of an apple tree on a stock can be carried out in the summer. This method of grafting with a sleeping bud is carried out from late July to mid-August, preferably during the period of the second sap flow, when the bark is moving well from the trunk. For scion, cuttings from the growth of the current year are suitable, as well as when grafting an apple tree with cuttings. A blank, 3-4 cm long, with a dormant bud located on it, is usually cut out from the middle part of the cutting using an budding knife, capturing part of the wood.In this case, at the bottom of the chips, it is necessary to cut off a part of the bark by 3 mm. It is better to prepare the cutting on the morning of the grafting day.

Two-year seedlings are ideal for rootstock, wild ones with a trunk diameter of 6–8 cm are ideal. When preparing seedlings, water them well a few days before budding and cut off the lower branches.

The ways

There are two ways to graft the scion: T-shaped and in the butt. T-shaped in technique is a little more complicated than the butt, since it requires the right time for the procedure, the so-called summer sap flow, when the bark is quite easily separated from the trunk. Therefore, consider the second method to graft the scion. It is simpler, accessible to everyone and does not require any special knowledge.

On the selected seedling at a height of 10-15 cm from the ground, we make an incision in the bark from top to bottom, grabbing the wood and leaving the tongue. A sliver with a bud and a petiole (which we saved on our scion) is carefully placed in the cut, combining the layers of wood and wrapped with grafting tape or electrical tape, while the petiole must be left free from the tape - it is an indicator of successful grafting. If within 2-3 weeks it falls off (on its own or with a light finger pressure) - the clothespin has taken root, if it turns black and remains in place - the procedure must be repeated, but in a new place on the trunk.

The harness is removed after 4 weeks, and the next year, in March, the trunk of the seedling is trimmed above the grafted bud. A year later, in August, it is necessary to cut off the thorn left over from the trunk, since over time it can become a source of infection for the entire tree. Cover the fresh cut with garden pitch. Now the shoot that has grown from the grafted bud has become the central conductor.

Video "Grafting an apple tree in summer"

On the Internet, information is often accompanied by a video of apple inoculation. This video will show you how to carry out the summer budding of apple trees.

Grafting other fruit trees

Many people ask the question "What can you plant an apple tree on?"You should know that only pome varieties, such as pear or quince, are grafted into an apple, which belongs to pome fruits. This rule also works in the opposite direction. While only stone fruits are grafted to stone fruits (plum, apricot), respectively - peach, sweet cherry, cherry.

Consider other ways of grafting fruit trees. The most affordable is the bark graft. Start by trimming the main branches of the fruit tree. You only need to leave a few, they will supply our tree with moisture. It is necessary to cut branches at a distance of at least 1 meter from the trunk. Places of cuts must be processed with a garden knife, and a grafting pruner will do just fine with this: cuts up to 6 cm long must be made on the bark. The cut itself must reach the core of the wood. Using the reverse side of the knife, push it apart onto the rootstock bark. This is necessary in order for the grafted clothespin to easily enter the incision we have prepared. On the scion, carefully make an oblique cut and carefully sharpen it. Then a grafted cutting can be introduced under the bark of the stock.

Try to match the slices as much as possible, and one slice fits snugly after the other. It is advisable to plant 3-4 cuttings at once. This is done so that after 2 years, when they finally take root, choose one of the strongest and most well-developed. Secure the installed cuttings with soft film. After grafting fruit trees, process all cuts with a garden varnish.

Now you know how to plant apple trees and when, and also that this procedure is relatively simple, but highly dependent on the correct sequence of actions. And if you take the process seriously, properly prepare all the necessary tools and master the theory, then you will certainly be able to inoculate the graft. And your apple tree will delight you not only with apples of various varieties, but also pears, plums or quince.