Feijoa grafting today!

[EdinTexas]

Feijoa - (Acca sellowiana) variety - “Unique” grafting today Granger, Tx

[Paul]

Quite late in the season, what are you going to do with them? I need your advice cause I was just grafting some about 14 days ago along with white sapotes and wondering what am I going to do with them over winter here in 7A/B. I don’t think they will survive indoors for 4 months. I have also an option to put them in greenhouse that is heated to 38F or another one with 60F. Thanks

[EdinTexas]

Paul I’m in 8B and will move mine into my greenhouse in about 5 to 6 weeks. I maintain the same temperature ranges as you mentioned in my greenhouse. My feijoas are pushing new growth now since we finally cooled off so the reason I’m grafting. Here is some I did last year about the same time.

[cousinfloyd]

I haven’t even tried to graft any feijoas yet. What are the basics I should know in order to have good success? Apparently the optimal time of year for grafting feijoas isn’t at all when I would have guessed.

[EdinTexas]

The main thing is good healthy and fresh wood. I wrap all my scions and the graft Union with “Buddy Tape” then pull the graft Union together with something a little stronger for extra pressure at the Union. I was running about 20% success rates with whips and clefts where I cut through rootstock completely back and now I’m running closer to 90% success rate by using a side graft or side veneer leaving the rootstock top until the scions start growing.
Ed

[Paul]

@cousinfloyd I grafted some last April and they were not waking up for a long time. I left them in shad and think they started to push bud once the temperatures got to upper 70s. I got about 30% success rate but the scionwood was in transit for almost 3 weeks. I forgot one on the sun just for few hours and the new growth got completely fried so be careful about that when grafting. Good time for grafting would be April/May and September in my zone 7A/B.
This is how they grow. 1st pic last May, second pic now

I still have about a month of growing season so they will be about 2ft by that time

[Paul]

@EdinTexas Sorry, don’t want to hijack this thread but how is your casimiroa pringlei experiment going? Have you tested it’s compatibility with edulis? I am still looking for seeds but I am on the right track now (I hope). Have you heard about casimiroa greggii? That might be another good candidate for cold hardy rootstock since it grows in the mountains of northern Mexico.

[cousinfloyd]

When would you collect the scion wood to graft in September? Would you use growth from the same year? And just cut off all the leaves? I’ve never grafted (at least not successfully) any kind of evergreen before.

[Paul]

You can collect it anytime and put in fridge but the fresher the better, like with any other plant material. Same year wood is the best. I noticed some people cut only half of the leaves or leave the top bud with leaves, I just cut everything off. From the evergreens I grafted so far (loquats, citrus, white sapote and feijoa) feijoa is definitely the hardest.

[EdinTexas]

Paul got busy collecting feijoas, loquats and persimmons so really haven’t got back to the Casimiroa Pringlei project. I hope to eventually get back to it.

Ed

[EdinTexas]

I agree feijoa is the absolute hardest to graft and I view grafting white Sapotes like grafting pears. Very easy.
Ed

[EdinTexas]

I remove 100% of the leaves and wrap scions completely with Buddy Tape, sprinkle a couple drops of water in bag and stick in the bottom of fridge till ready to graft. I only use the wood that is harden off and discard the soft flimsy new growth.
Ed

[EdinTexas]