Yes
I agree.
@Oepfeli Get a stake electrical taped (very well, put a good deal of tape on) for the cultivars you wish to choose and find where you won’t be criss-crossing growth and begin tying the new growth to each stake for each scion you want to push extremely good/strong growth of. Pinch the others back now and as they wish to grow thru the year. Keep pinching them so all growth goes to the scion(s) you staked.
Thank you @Barkslip and @steveb4 for the detailed instructions. With last years grafts I didn’t stake at all. I intended to, but never got around to it and they all turned out fine (none broken off by wind or birds). However, I probably can’t depend on being so lucky again…
You can always take a chance. I lost a hickory graft this year to a bird or wind because my bud and I were grafting and he wanted to move on and not put a stake on everything on a multi-grafted tree… so I re-grafted recently to see if I get another take.
Best wishes…
Hello Dennis,
Grafts are doing well. See pictures below. Some are growing well, some are “hesitating”. Maybe it’s because of the used methods (whip&tongue, modified cleft, cleft). I think the ones done with the whip&tongue are doing best. To be sure about this, I have to remove the tape (but it is too soon for that, the grafts are done only 3 weeks ago). I did also 4 bud grafts. One is already “pushing”, but the others are also swelling, so I think they will break through next week or so.
Very good your results much better than mine! I will try your technique next year! Thanks for sharing
Good luck, they look to me to be working!
Dennis
Nothing special. It’s Just electrical self adhesive tape. I cut several strips of about 20 cm, and I divide them also lenghtwise in 2. I place then these strips on a plate, so that I can pick them when I start grafting. So I don’t loose time during grafting.
Jack
My gerrardi mulberry graft has reached the top of that cattle panel tomato cage … 50 inches.
I have 4 more good months of growing season… may see 6 ft or more in this first season ?
Slow growers… not in TN when strapped to a big ole white mulberry stump.
wish mine took off like that. my buds are green and open and 1 grew a inch so its a definite take but slow to grow out. mines illni everbearing on 4in. white mulberry. maybe its waiting for more heat? its been humid and in the low 80’s the last couple days but cooling of again next week. how many scions are on yours Trev?
4 scions… 2 buds each and all 8 are growing nicely now. One was slower than the rest… but it is taking off now.
It has been extra hot here this year and it seems to like it.
i have 2 with 2 buds each. all growing. i think the cool weather is the deciding factor here.
@steveb4 — if you look close at the picture above… I have 6 shoot (from 3 scions, 2 buds each) running up in the diameter of that cattle panel tomato cage. They are quite tight on space… but I just keep pushing them in, instead of letting them go out the cage and they continue going up in the diameter of that spce.
Then if you look there in the front left, near the top of that green stake… you will see one shoot coming out the low front left. That is one of the buds / shoots from that scion that was slower to take than the rest. It is much smaller, I actually thought it might die (get shaded out) at one point there because the rest were growing so much faster… but nope, now it has started growing, and yesterday was making its way out the low/mid front left there.
I think I am just going to keep pushing them all inside the cage and let them go up and out the top this year - that should make it a nice tidy and tight bush at least initially. Once the leaves drop, I will take that cage off… may have to cut it off, not sure… but will get that off and early next spring I will determine how many of those shoots I want to leave in place when I prune.
I may leave all… or just keep the best 4-6 shoots.
I think eventually I will have to put a much larger cattle panel ring around it, as a deer deterrent. Some have warned that deer love mulberry leaves and this one if the perfect height for deer browse.
Around here, raccoons LOVE mulberries. They’ve left purple piles all over the place.
@snowjunky — purple piles… funny.
Around here in the fall… Possum and Coons leave piles of poo loaded with persimmon seeds on our county road. I think it is mostly coons that do that, they seem to prefer to place their poo in a wide open highly visible place — probably marking territory.
I remember strudledog11 on youtube saying that birds like his gerardi mulberry and that it is best to pick them early in the morning before the birds get to them.
My two goumi bushes were so loaded this year, that the birds got all they wanted and we did too. Hope it works out like that with mulberries.
Japanese beetles are eating pecan, persimmon, & pawpaw. I don’t recall them ever eating any of these.
I had a similar plan for about 30 trees and did end up having to spread branches aggressively because they grew in so tight. Even with a larger cage the next year they still outgrew it.
@Rosdonald — something like this would be Ok with me…
That is strudledog11’s tree (northern GA)… which is not all that far from me here in southern TN.
It looks to have some age to it and he says it is only about 6 ft tall, says it does not really require a lot of pruning… it is quite bushy, loaded with fruit for a couple months.
That size and shape would work for me. I figure if I need to… I can stake and pull those shoot out (like I do with my fig tree) to open it up some next spring.
Oh no! Is it real bad?
bad.
Shoot. Sorry, that was maybe a stupid question on my part. I don’t have so much experience with them but have seen pics of damage, so I was imagining it could be awful.
