It puts me in mind of looking up an old German apple, Edelborsdorfer, and reading a German description. I am not fluent, yet had a pretty good feel for the text. Maybe Google Translate would pin down details? Reading that, I laughed until I hurt.
(BTW, I tried Edelborsdorfer. It proved to be one of several that gassed away flavor and keeping qualities in the rigorous dry heat I contend with. There was only one way to find out & am glad to have tried it. It was a spotless, upright, heavy-twigged tree, nearly 11 feet tall on G41 in its 8th leaf. It had fair fruit set with limited blooming in its 7th & 8th leaf.)
Yeah, could be. So how do I know the moment ājust before they kill itā?
FWIW, Iāve attached a stick to my trunk. Then Iāve wrapped a cord ~3 times around the mass of shoots. The upper half of the shoots is more or less free to move, but the lower half should be stable unless there is really extreme wind. And even then, I have 16 grafts ā 8 each from 2 varieties. It wouldnāt ruin the effort to lose even half of them.
Iām not exactly sure, but when I see thereās a good amount of bulge above and below my tape, I start getting worried that it might have trouble before I check it again, for zip ties I would expect it to be very visible and difficult to cut the zip tie once thereās really a good bulge on either side.
And when Iām āremovingā tape, my new favorite way it to cut through most of the layers maybe leaving the last one or some points that are not cut through in the middle, and let the tree grow and break it off. (For anyone who wants to whine about the plastic waste falling on the ground or maybe blowing in the wind, if the graft fails, Iām going to have to use all that plastic again to make another graft.)
I thought about waiting, but then wondered if by constraining growth at the graft (forcing a bulge) I would be retarding growth of the scion. Seems like weāre guessing. In any case, I left the tape on all the apples and persimmons. I removed the tape only on this large pear, mainly because it was already falling off.
Well, my Olympic Asian pear seems be deciding to die. I have no idea why. It was growing very nicely, then started looking very drippy on hot days (despite only having maybe 4 hours direct sun), but would perk back up. Today itās dropped and shriveled. I have been watering it when I remember because it has been so arid, but not a lot. No idea what else it could be. This is the tree that I cut down, and regrafted because it had a crazy high graft and was planning to espalier
If I understand the sizes of whatās happening there, you have a massive Scion on that rootstock, and it probably had enough stored energy to grow those leaves, but it didnāt connect well enough to provide the leaves with enough water, but perhaps Iām wrong and it got bumped it too heavy and your callous broke and now is dying because it broke off and might not ever be able to reheal.
Interesting thought. It hasnāt been bumped at all, so I donāt think the graft has moved. it was grafted 4/10 and had longer shoots that I cut or pinched back due to how I meant to grow it. It could really have grown for 2 months on scion alone? Iāll see what happens ocer the next week or so and then unwrap it if clearly dying.
if the graft dies off in the next week, unwrap it and you will know if it took or not. i just had a pear graft die off in a couple days. looked exactly like all of the other grafts i did at the same time. was close to 12". havent unwrapped it yet but ill do it and post back.
I think itās 3/4ā. Big. This is all interesting to learn, thank you. It was a bit of a crap shoot doing it and fun that I thought it worked. Oh well!
@weatherandtrees interesting thought. The fence is facing south east (more so east) and because of whatās around it and its proximity to the fence, it only has sun from about 10:15-barely 2pm. But, it could still be baking from the west side of the fence heating up in the afternoon and that hadnāt crossed my mind. I was planning on moving it in the fall to 2ā from the fence and further down where it will have more sun.
Has the rootstock been sending up suckers and getting leaves on it? (all my pear rootstocks seem to sucker like crazy). Have you pulled the mulch back and looked at the rootstock? Iām wondering if something happened to the rootstockā¦ In the picture there are what look like two little chew marks on the side of it. It could just be the light or the picture though.
I think big grafts are definitely possible, but they should probably have nails, or even screws. This graft was probably 5/8 where I shaved it down and it survived, but itās nailed in, I think tacks in the graft and large nails to hold the bark down to be removed later.
The big thing with large grafts is that the bigger the graft, the more wood there will be unattached in the center of it, and it never heals together. So with a big graft itās like a big crack that will always be there, with patch grafting, thereās no wood and no missing part. With whip and tongue thereās a little gap and the wood is meshed together giving strength in 3 cardinal directions, with chhip budding or T-budding, very little gap but no strength in the graft mechanics.
So itās awesome that you did it, but I really wish you had screwed it in with a couple of screws, and I think it would have survived like thay, but who knows? Maybe it was a different issue.
Thank you. No ooze. Yes it was looking droopy in the afternoons and would perk up for a bit before this abrupt decline but never shriveled or black. The 2 tips that are black in the picture I punched off a week ago. The ones not pinched are not black. Yet.
My guess on that graft is the tree was unhappy already from being grafted and the heat did it in. With that fence it could be 120F if the sun was hitting it. Itās not a bad idea to put shade cloth on grafts if it looks like they are in too much heat. I had an apple die this spring and I decided I could still replace it this year so I put the new tree in last week, but I wrapped the whole thing in shade cloth to help it with the sun/heat.
I havenāt found the size of scion to matter a lot, teeny or huge it can all work if you get good contact. All things being equal I would prefer a bit smaller, but this spring for example I had two scions that were fat boys, and both took off.
Donāt do that, digging up a tree in growing season is a severe setback. I have killed far too many trees trying to do that. Maybe I finally learned my lesson. Well actually I didnāt, I dug up a peach volunteer in early spring hoping I got it early enough but it had leafed out a bit. Its dead now.
Go team!
