On a completely different note, I have been grafting to small rootstock. Mostly I have bought rootstock, grown them where I wanted them for a year, then cleft grafted the next year. Three years ago I planted a Marianna 2624 in my mom’s yard. That stock is now larger than all but my largest peach tree. I want to put something better on it for her, but I am hesitant with what to do. It’s got about a two and a half inch caliper trunk. Should I treat it as an established tree, and top it with bark grafts (which I have never done) , or should I just graft to branches farther up? Am I over thinking it, and should I just put some chip or tbuds right about the ground on the trunk? I want her to have pretty flowers, edible fruit and fun; she largely enjoys the tree as a hedge between her and the toddlers next door.
Finally I got around to tally my grafts this year. Out of 105 grafts, 90 took and 15 failed.
A.plums, A pears and E. Pears, apricots all got 100% take. Only 1 of 24 apple grafts failed.
I grafted cherries early, 4/10/16, with a good result (9 out 11 took).
Peaches/nectarines are the most interesting story.
I grafted the first round on 5/10/16. The weather was in low to mid 70 for about 3 days. 17 took, 5 failed. The quality of failed scionwood was questionable to begin with.
The second peach/nect igrafting was on 5/25, the weather was in high 70 and low 80’s. Only 1 in 5 grafts took (an Arctic Glo on peach).
I plan to graft cherry early again next year. As for peaches, I will graft when the weather is in the 70’s. To me, it is more important to graft on last year’s wood, not older wood. The qualty of scionwood is also an important factor to grafting success.
104 out of 105 grafts were cleft. I did a lone splice graft and it also took.
Thanks for the report! I am a bit surprised on how high 70s/low 80’s coincided with the peach failure, that is usually really good weather for me. I often am using aluminum foil though and maybe it made those temps seem more like low/mid 70s with the foil on.
One other factor beyond air temp is soil temp, the earlier the colder the soil. It is surprising how cool the wood still is on a warm spring day, water is a much better conductor than air and all that cool is conducting up from the soil. With that factor it means for earlier grafting you want warmer temps than later grafting. I have a thermoprobe and wish I had measured internal cambium temperatures on stocks this spring.
I am really surprised and happy about the amount of successful Peach and Apricot grafts after zero the past two years.I guess the temperatures made a difference and possibly my technique has improved.
I didn’t keep any records at the time they were started.Probably something worthwhile to do. Brady
Scott,
The high 70 and low 80 may be ideal weather but i think there were a couple other factors that may have contributed to my 2nd round peach failures.
- the scionwood quality. I got them since Jan/Feb. By late May, they were long in the tooth.
- I did not use foil to protect grafts against hot sun
- by then, rain was more sporadic and the soil was getting
drier
When I grafted earlier with the temp in the 70, we have plenty of moisture as it rained every 5-7 days. The scionwood were in decent shape.
I hope my grafting success this year is not a fluke 
Also, once I realized my mistake of grafting Harrow Delight pear on a peach tree, I did something out of desperation. I cut off those two grafts while leaves started pushing, one of them already flowered. The scionwood still looked good with green cambium. I grafted one on Blake’s Pride and another on Harrow Sweet. They both took.
Pear is a really forgiving tree when it comes to grafting indeed.
Very impressive! That is a lot of grafting and a very high percentage of takes.
Do you plan on doing that much grafting every year?
Warm,
I was surprised myself after tallying the number of grafts. A few of those grafts are duplicates.
I don’t think I want to do that many again. It is hard ro keep track of them. Some grafts are not placed in a good position on the trees. Those could be removed. I am over the moon for the good result. It is encouraging.
The two fruit I would want to graft in the future are paw paw and jujube.
By the way, Bob Vance did over 500 grafts this year. That is impressive .
Nice job, Tip.
Thanks, Matt.
In fact, I’d like to say THANK YOU to all the people with whom I exchanged scionwood. A few of you even donated it without an exchange. There are many of you. I will not name names as I fear I might forget some names 
You are very generous. I am thankful.
For the newer members, I’d like you to know that the people in this forum are very kind and supportive. We all benefit from being kind to one another.
Bad location? Yeah…i’ve got many grafts like that. I have limbs crisscrossing, laying on other limbs… When you get 10 or more variety in one tree it can get out of hand. I need to rebuild a new tree that is a lot cleaner.
Warm,
New grafter like me always learn something about grafting. Wish I could learn all those in one shot so I can save time 
Some of those grafts are too low, too hidden, too odd an angle, you name it. Always something.
I feel like this is probably a relax, don’t worry question, but… Is this normal callous tissue on these cleft grafts I made this year?
Well, it is pretty gnarly looking, isn’t it! I’ve had a few grafts like that on my frankenapple and the tree seems to manage OK. Not sure just what causes it. Your grafts took off nicely -you’ll probably be removing one soon, I imagine- and that’s a very good sign.
Let us know next year how it looks and we’ll all be a bit the better for it.
Yeah… it is very gnarly looking. The grafts have grown a lot, and after a brief pause for the solstice, they are growing actively again.
I did all my grafts with splicing rubber tape (3M Temflex). I am wondering if some of it isn’t formation of root initials because of moisture and dark under the grafting tape??
Thats what it looks like to me… I had a grape graft this year which really wants to send out roots right above the graft point, I have never seen a grape graft do that.
Huh… I suspect that those licensed to propagate these G.969 rootstocks should find it a profitable endeavour then. They wanted to form roots on them last fall when a bunch of leaves blew into the rabbit fencing I had around them in the nursery bed.
Hopefully this tissue is still somewhat undifferentiated and can turn into cambium rather than turn into a huge burr knot.
I might have to reconsider this Temflex tape and go towards a few turns of rubber band plus parafilm if all my grafts turn out this way. Funny that I’m the only one seeing this with temflex.
I will keep folks updated.
I grafted a bunch of J. plums, pears, apples, nectarines and peaches this year. Most of the plums and pears took. About 30% of apples took but total failure on the nectarine and peaches.
Here’s a picture of a plum’s graft. The tape lending itself to give new life but also almost takes away life if I delay to take action… 
