Peach grafts

I think our weather is similar. Next Mon will be 60, Tues 70 and Wed 80. Not sure why a rush. Can’t it just go to up slowly and stay in the 70 for a week or two.

I usually alternate between Temflex and green garden tape. I may just use green garden tape to secure my grafts if it will be so hot so soon.

Thanks. Adding that to “to do list” this weekend .

Alan, I did try peaches in the 60’s in the past and got bad results. Unfortunately I didn’t log the details and it was a long time ago, but its a reason why I switched to 70’s. I also heard 70’s from a longstanding NAFEX member I don’t remember who it was now. It may have been 60’s and not sunny when I failed. 60’s with sun can warm up the unions to the perfect temperature. Thats probably my best guess now, either do 60s and sunny, 70s with either sunny or not, or 80’s and cloudy (or covered completely with aluminum foil).

Hey @Susu do you remember the high temps for the week or so after you did your peach grafts, and how sunny it was?

Temps were in mid 70’s when I did my grafting. Since this is my first year grafting I pretty much followed your timing. I had such great success with it I think I’ll stick to 70’s in the future too.
Great luck with apples too. All but one chip bud leafed out. I haven’t given up on chip bud. I’m guessing they take longer to show signs of take than other types?

Susu,
Congrats. It is not just beginner’s luck. I think you have spent a lot of time reading, asking questions and learning how to graft. I am very happy for you.

@BobVance, i did not graft this evening. Got busy with other yard chores. I checked 10 weather forecast again. I will graft on Mon when it will ge in the 50’s. Temp will go up to 70 and 80 successively. I will find out if my peach grafts will work. So far, the scions are a bit long in the tooth and the trees are further along than I like. We’ll see. I think of it as an experiment.

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Maybe keep some aside to graft on Friday? You’ve got 80 and 87 on Wed/Thursday, which would be pretty quick after Monday. From Friday on, for 8 days, it stays in the 69-76 range, which sounds perfect.

I did some apricot grafts this morning (on K1 and plum), but after those, I’m done until next Friday, at which point I’ll take stock of what needs re-grafting and do the persimmons.

Do you mean, in addition to grafting this coming Mon, I’d ser aside a few peach scions to graft on next Fri? Will do.

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I’m going to wait until the end of the highest heat of that spell- we can compare notes in a month. I might do some J.plum grafting during the heat. I’ll be free of spraying by next Weds. and have some time to graft.

One reason I didn’t do any stonefruit but E. plums earlier, is there was always something even more important to do as I got a late rush on tree sales. But now I’m addicted to offering peach and nect trees with more than one variety and a whole month of harvest potential. I’m such an idiot that I don’t even charge more for the trees after going to all the extra trouble of gathering and storing scion wood, agonizing about when to graft and then finally doing it. I don’t even enjoy the labor of grafting, only the results. I’m a pretty good grower, but terrible businessman.

Yes watch out for that 87. If you have peach grafts healing in those temps I would put a big piece of aluminum foil over the whole thing, with 6-8 inches of coverage beyond the union. Shiny side out!

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Thanks for the tips. I will play it by ears re. If I should graft some on Mon when temp will fluctuate wildly atfer that or wait until Thurs when temp will be in the 70’s.

I don’t think I inherently enjoy grafting (always worried I’ll end up with less blood than when I started…), but it does feel like magic when a graft starts to grow. It’s a powerful feeling to be able to (relatively) quickly re-arrange what is growing in a spot.

I’m not sure how they do in the heat, but they seem to do fine relatively early. I appear to be 13/13 for the J plums grafted in April. And 11/12 on Euro plums, which includes 3 onto an unknown red-leafed tree (rental). Maybe a sand cherry.

That may or may not be a bad decision. Two true statements which support opposite outcomes: 1- most nurseries charge almost double for multi-grafts. 2- most nurseries charge $15-20 more for multi-grafts.

I’m thinking that #2 might be the more important. If you are charging a (very) premium amount for the trees, then $15-20 starts to become within rounding error, or at least less significant. It becomes more important to ensure a good experience, than getting a bit more for each trees. .

Last year, when I put on foil, I’m pretty sure I didn’t go 6-8" past the union. Maybe 1-2". It’s possible that not wanting to waste a bit of foil did in some of my grafts…

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That statement is so funny to me and exactly the kind of thinking I’m prone too, in spite of it being a failure of logical deduction on the whole. Have you ever bought a pair of boots that were just a little tight because they were half price?

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I have many such “good deal” items. I am currently wearing a too-small shirt. But it was 80% off!!

Re: the foil, I don’t always cover that far but I am going to in the future on hot days, in particular after the bad results from last year.

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At least you wear the “good deal” item. Me, I usually buy it because it’s such a good deal and then it turns out I have no use for it. Store it for a while and then sneak into the trash after a while.

This is a really interesting topic!
I am assuming that the thread really deals with grafting in the colder regions where high chill hours are not an issue however frost and low temperatures often determine the outcome
I live in Australia in a sub tropical climate and grow low chill varieties of peaches, nectarines and plums. We are a week away from our winter and all of the stone fruit are not bothering with dormancy this year, setting fruit on the peaches and nectarines. This has happened before and I fielded two crops, one from the fall flush and the other much larger crop from the spring flush.
I would like to spread out my harvest by adding slightly later maturing varieties but have no room for additional trees. After reading this thread I see a number of problems regarding grafting new varieties onto the existing trees. Temperatures now are in the range from mid 50s to high 70s. In a month’s time they will be in the range 45-60 or thereabouts so timing may be an issue with such a long time of relatively high temperatures.
Is there any advice that can be offered regarding the best time/times to attempt grafting and the type of graft most likely to succeed?

Thanks in advance for your advice.

Mick
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Slicko,

For me, cleft grafts work best on peaches. High-placed T-buds can also work- as well as rind grafts.

Providing them apical dominance is key. Day by day, prune away surrounding growth to allow the desired scion to hog more of the tree’s energy.

Grafting after dormancy breaks, just as the trees are pushing new spring growth is the best time for me. Others say that summertime budding is better, but hot sunshine can zap the grafts and dry them out.

I wrap them completely, tightly, with electrician’s tape. If doing a cleft, I wrap all the way up the scion - taking care not to cover the buds - in a candycane fashion. This helps seal in moisture, and provides the scion stick protection from the sun.

Some people put little tin hats on their peach grafts to shade them. Crazy peach grafts wearing crazy aluminum-foil hats. The things we do in pursuit of life’s variety!

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Matt,

Thanks for your very detailed reply, it’s very informative.

It’s a funny thing about dormancy with these trees as they seem not to be worrying about it this year. I am thinking that I could try grafting now as our winters are mild - we don’t even frost and I could get them through winter. Or I could wait until bud swell in August when most of cold winds have gone.
I’ll take a pic of the tree tomorrow and indicate to show where I am thinking of doing the grafts.

Thanks again for your advice

Mick

Wait until peaches start growth. That is the same process that will heal the graft union. Grafts will likely die if you make them during a period of little growth, no matter what the species. Apples and pears have more water-proof wood and also contain more stored energy in that wood so aren’t in need of such vigorous growth immediately after the graft- this just allows you to graft them somewhat earlier, even slightly before first growth coming out of dormancy.

Of course this is all contradicted by the success of “sleeping eye” peach grafts where a bud essentially survives the winter before growth. Sorry, I only have all this partially figured out.

Olpea sent me a small tree with one of these sleeping eye grafts that did not survive our winter- but he has success in KS with them.

Thanks Alan for those comments

I guess that I am best to wait for the first sign of bud swell before I do the work. The trees have dropped all their leaves but continue to open some flowers. I suppose that I should consider that this is their version of dormancy.

My apples are still in full leaf so they are waiting for the colder months.

Mick

I grafted a couple peaches about 10 days ago I think. I’m still grafting in fairly hot weather (minimum 80F for the highs).

The biggest problem I feel I have with grafting peaches is that the small rootstocks seem to get a little shocked from the beheading. If I put a graft on an existing tree (for storage) takes seem to be more consistent. This year I left little nurse branches on all the small rootstock.

I agree with Alan that good growth in the rootstock is probably pretty important. I see the most callus tissue for pruning cuts happen the quickest on trees growing vigorously.

Budding in late summer is by far the most successful for me. The only reason I did more than usual peach grafts this spring is because some patents expired recently and wanted to try to get an extra season in on some of these trees.

BTW, I’ve noticed some of Paul Fridays varieties have patents starting to expire, as well as some in the Stellar series.

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