Questions not deserving of a whole thread

Thanks, I’ve already read it, but I don’t recall when was the best time to do it.

I have 2 very simple and most likely very dumb questions:

  1. Can I graft a EUROPEAN Plum to a wild domestic plum. I’m afraid I’m not sure what kind of wild plum it is. I suspect Prunus americana just going off photos I’ve seen but I’m not at all sure.

  2. I have a persimmon that I bought from an online nursery several years ago as a Japanese Persimmon (lost track of what variety it was supposed to be). All it has ever done for 5 years is produce really small flowers that from what I understand means it is a male tree. Can I cut it off completely about 2-3 feet from ground and bark graft it (ie top work it) with some saijo scion wood I have? Will the fact that it is a male tree have any impact on the new graft and/or the tree that I will be “making” by combining the 2?

Thanks.

I would agree with that, except for yellow back raspberries. None are sold, but they exist in the wild. I have one.

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I prepared my raspberry run yesterday. I made the run to accommodate 3ft spacing of all the plants. So, it’s about 35ft long for the 2 plants that are there now, and the 10 I’m adding. I made it about 3ft wide, is that wide enough to accommodate any future suckering?

Yes and no. They will sucker 20 feet at times. Three feet sounds reasonable. Any outside of that remove. I have mine in raised beds and they often come up in my other raised beds, so I’m pulling them out all the time. It’s fairly easy to do, and has worked fine for me. I gave only 2 foot width, just because of room. I have a raised bed for them that is 2x24. I think i used 2 foot spacing, the more the better though. Now mine are all over each other. Not sure what is what? I figure let the strong survive. Actually I have been growing them years, and I can tell what is what by growth habit, fruit, color of canes, amount of spines etc. They have mixed up somewhat. I’m going to have a bumper crop this year.
I grow both everbearing and summer bearing. I sometimes harvest 2 crops from the everbearing. Some years i cut them down to the ground in fall. I left them last fall, so the amount of berries is going to be large.

Also I’m very excited to get the first large crop from Irene, my own cultivar. It looks a lot like Double Gold, and those look good too, so i can compare them side by side. See how they differ. Hopefully a lot! I also have another cross that will fruit for the first time. It could be any color, most likely red. I want to make one more cross for now. On blackberries I planted some crossed seed outside last year, see if any come up. i have future cross projects with them planned.

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Thanks, I thought 3ft would be plenty of space, especially for the reds.

I saw today that I had another Triple Crown cutting had sprouted, that makes 4 out of 7 so far, after 5 weeks. This really warm weather ought to coax the others up soon. They sure have taken their time, but the weather’s been cool, cloudy and wet since they were planted.

What are Irene’s parents? Funny you mention Double Gold, that’s one of the gold’s I’m planting along with Fall Gold. I guess your floricanes made it okay thru this winter?

What kind of crossing did you do, and what are your future crosses with your blackberries?

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Anne was the mother, and Polka the pollen parent. I wanted to make an orange berry i was just going for color. It turned out pink. I had 5 plants come up, but 4 died when i went on vacation. Only Irene survived. It was three times bigger than the other four, so it survived because of it’s size. Probably a good thing. I want to cross Cascade Gold because it is my favorite yellow, a very firm berry, it is more a solid yellow than translucent yellow. The berries are huge with top rate flavor. Very different from other yellows. With Josephine which is a very symmetrical large berry. Kevin says it consistently out produces all others. I just started growing it. i should have berries this year. i did have a few last year. taste is excellent too. Two proven winners in many ways. Trying for that orange again!

Yes, some everbearing don’t do well, some produce small summer crops, some tend to die over winter. I decided to let them all go another year to further rate them. Caroline, and

Polka are poor floricane performers, but giving them another chance. In the future, I will just harvest fall crop on poor performers. Fall Gold does well with 2 crops, probably the best! An excellent choice BTW. My 2nd favorite raspberry. Well right up there for sure.

I’m trying to bring the western blackberry flavor to an eastern hardy blackberry. So crossing various east with west in the future. My eastern is young. All I have is Darrow. I do have some scion of wild.I’ll be trying to propagate soon. So Darrow with various western types, mostly raspberry-blackberry cultivars. Hard to do as blackberries can have different number of chromosomes and won’t cross, or produce sterile offspring. So a shot in the dark really.

None of this breeding is deep, or for profit. It’s for fun, I like plants so looking to learn as much as I can about them. It keeps it interesting for me.

Not bad! You may get more, and you can do it again. Well one plant should give you as many plants as you’ll need. Triple Crown will make your raspberries look tame. I removed mine last year. And found 10 tip rooted plants in the mass of canes this beast produces.
Berries are very good. I had too many blackberry plants, some had to go.

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I have seen claims that Euro plum should do fine on P. americana, but I’m afraid there is not enough info about long-term compatibility.

Yes, you can. The sex of the tree has no effect on the graft. For persimmon grafts it’s important to diligently remove all growth on the understock.

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is Irene still a floricanes crop or did you get any on primocanes?

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I meant to ask you a couple more questions. Should I mulch the raspberries now that I’m done planting? I have some straw I could use. And, do I need to fertilize them this year or hold off until next season?

I was wondering if you’ve tried growing any of the UofA PrimeArk or their other thornless blackberries, and if so how have they done.

planted a few anne last season and have a couple fall gold coming from indianaberry. anne may be too late producing for me to get much of a crop up here, but fall goold supposedly produces much earlier so im hopefull. i cut all my everbearings to the ground for only 1 crop. might find a spot to grow some florocane producing varieties so i get summer berries. prelude is a great producer up here.

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The Primocanes didn’t fruit last year. so it may be summer bearing. it looks as if it is. Growth is to the top of the five foot floricanes this year. No new primocanes yet, this year, they are just starting to push leaves, green tip right now. Both parents are everbearing, see what they do this year.

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definitely mulch your berries. i use wood chips but straw will work. id wait till your plants start showing some growth and then lightly fertilize .

I like to mulch, I mulch everything. If just planted this year, compost or organic or 1/2 dose of soluble would be fine. Some feel you should not feed them. I found they do better if fed. Slow sometimes to establish. I have not grown any of the primocane fruiting blackberries. I have grown Navaho, tastes a lot like Triple Crown, which is very good to excellent. I liked it better than Triple Crown just because it was not a vigorous and easier to control. From U of A too. Other thornless, Lochness, and Columbia Star. All did fine here. I removed all my thornless plants. I like the trailing thorny types. New Berry, Boysen, Wyeberry, Siskayou, Marion and tayberry. I like those over the thornless types. I was getting gallons upon gallons of berries, I needed to get rid of some. Some of my friends are a little mad as I would give them gallon bags. I informed them those days are over. I put in a small serviceberry, gooseberry, and honeyberries in their place. I still have 6 blackberry cultivars, that is enough! None produce like the thornless do, at least not yet. Triple Crown Lochness and oh yeah Chester produce over 500 berries a plant. Also these all ripened in the height of the SWD season so I constantly had to spray them. To much work for a fruit that is not my favorite. I was thinking of buying mosquito netting to protect plants. Wyeberry, Boysen, and tayberry ripen early before they are here, but the others do not.

My Apple tree was planted in 2016. It has been sitting there sulking ever since. Probably put on 2-4 inches of growth last year. I did some reading and it looks like experienced members here recommend giving slow growers a dose of urea. I bought a bag of urea (it doesn’t say how to use on fruit trees)
I nderstand urea can burn trees easily. So I wanted to check and find out how much to add around this tree. Planted 2016. Half inch trunk diameter. 45-0-0 stuff.

I have 2 grafts of Margil both from usda. One is vigorous and upright and the other is weeping, which is the true Margil?

Drew, if you are looking for any test dummies to trial Irene outside of Michigan I’ll be the first in line. I have a prime spot available in my raspberry run after I sent Brandywine packing.

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Sure, maybe in the fall.I need to confirm a sucker is from Irene.

Hi, I was wondering: have you ever graft on a new bareroot fruit tree (the year you plant it)? Can it succed?

Yes, it works. It’s just a large bench graft.

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