Peach seedlings and some grafts on mature PF Lucky 13 peach, and spice Z nectaplum (I have a euro plum on it too).
I plan on using seedlings when needed. I was thinking of seeds from Red Haven, Redskin, and PF 24c. I don’t have room for more trees, I have three seedlings currently, and no plans for more. I might do a bunch when I move. But that might not be for a few years, or never?
If I were to buy rootstock i would buy only Lovell for this area. Works great here.
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I have Lovell and hope they work this year. Will try some existing redhaven trees as well.
Also will pick a few trees up from Tractor Supply that sale for 8 bucks or so and graft to them.
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So these look like what you saw @ TS? This was from last week at a nearby store. They were $13, I believe.
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That is exactly them! Didn’t remember the cost but I have a few scions that are I’m excited to graft. I will use a few of those for grafting to.
Thanks for the tease pictures 
I had forgot about the Blue Damson plum there. The back side display had the apples- Red and Golden Del, Jonathan and Honeycrisp. For $13 a pop, I’d be willing to try a Jonathan. All of them had a nice caliper to them, I just wonder what shape the roots are in, and if they’re still moist. I wonder if being in that somewhat warm store if they’ll start coming out of dormancy soon.
I’ve done hundreds of splice grafts over the years, if the scion and stock match up they are super reliable and heal much more quickly than the other types. The whip and tongue variation I always found too much work, if I had good wedges on each side I had all the contact I needed. You do need to make sure both cuts are flat, if its a bit curved you may not be getting complete contact. Sometimes I see they are curved a bit, but with enough pressure they all are touching. So I wrap those ones really tightly so they stay touching. If the size is off its perfectly good to align one side only, I have done a huge number of those. Pick the side to align which has the best contact of cambium, I often try it each way and pick the best one. If the wedges are not the same angle or size just take another whack at the stock or scion to get a fresh cut.
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I have found that the one sided blades make straighter cuts, as i tend to get this curve, so that one sided knife made a difference. Much better anyway.
Also watching a video on fig grafting, It was mentioned more hormones are around the bud nodes, so if one side has a node try there first with different sized scion.
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I tried a couple times to graft with knives that were not one-sided - I probably had misplaced my grafting knife and needed to get some grafts finished. Every time I wondered how anyone could get such a graft to work, the cuts were much harder to get to come out reasonably.
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My husband does the knife work when grafting since he’s an accomplished wood carver and more than a little comfortable with using a knife. But last spring when I got my new ARS hand pruners I mentioned to him that others on the forum had good luck using them for cutting the wood. He tried it and never went back to using the knife (except for the tonque–we do almost all W&T). It seemed to make the whole process calmer and easier. Since I do the wrapping I much prefer W&T. I find it more stressful trying to keep the simple splice pieces lined up while wrapping.
I should mention that it’s a well sharped hand pruner. If you don’t already have sharpening in your blood I’d like to put in a big plug for it. It REALLY makes whatever job you’re doing a lot easier and more fun. It’s a worthwhile skill (an understatement), and anyone can do it. I’m not really great at it but when I was carving regularly (spoons) I learned to sharpen my own tools so I know it’s not that hard to learn and you don’t have to be really great to get good results, whether it’s your kitchen knife or a hoe. It’s one of those things you’ll be so happy you did. I appreciate that I have someone to do the difficult pieces but I also know I can do an adequate job if need be. It’s satisfying, makes life better, and once you get into it you’ll never be tempted to use a dull cutting tool again. You won’t want to. Sue
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I Bought three Redhaven peaches like that from the farm store last year. I was horrified when I saw the butchered roots. I planted them in compost mounds and 2 out of 3 lived.
I have been grafting whips with a utility knife this year. It’s much easier to replace the blade then sharpen a knife.
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Here are the stats:
I looked back at some pictures I took last year to see what April 10th equates to and I have some of Apricots just starting to bloom. So this year, I’ll probably start grafting peaches around then. Last year I had just started grafting apples the week before, so i had thought it was pretty early for peaches, which is why I just did 3.
One other potential impact is that for later grafts, the scionwood has sat around in the fridge for longer.
How early did you do them, both by temps and bloom? I think I did most of mine when temps were at least in the 60’s, though they weren’t consistently there for the early ones.
I think there are multiple variables to really know the best. But doing it is stages helps you zero in on it, as well as spreading the risk around. It’s best to avoid 0 for xxx, which is possible with peaches. It’s much more forgiving with apples/pears. I’ve grafted apples in the dark (pick up a flashlight to check it maybe once or twice per graft) and gotten 50%+ success (95%+ normally). Now that I’ve got a head-lamp, I’m sure I can do even better 
I took Alan’s suggestion of making the cuts for splice grafts with pruners. Then I just need to get the angles to roughly match.
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Yes, the first year this was a factor for me. It can be all of the problem!
I think it’s best to graft when sap flow is strongest, which is early., You tap sugar maples very early. So times and temperatures are going to vary depending on your location.
Even though there probably isn’t significant data, I’ve made a pretty picture from it. The results are surprisingly linear (R squared of .997). The success rate drop 1.77% per day. The biggest flaw I see is the tiny sample on April 10th (3/3 success). I suspect that if I had done 10-15 grafts I would have gotten something more like 80% or 90% at best.
Speaking of the data, there were more than 5 days that I grafted on. But rather than having a lot of datapoints with only 3-4 grafts, I grouped them when they were close. For example, 5/4, 5/6, and 5/8 are all bucketed together as 5/6.
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The temps were in the low 60s and took a dive for about two weeks. These were all grafted to rootstock in pots. Mid April and all the peaches were in bloom here so I thought I would be ok… just didn’t count on the temp dropping for two weeks.
My thought is to wait after frost this time if I can control my enthusiasm. That would be mid May.
One important factor in these temps is if its sunny or not. I don’t know exactly how much the wood (the graft junction in particular) heats up due to sun but a guess is 10 degrees, and it could be even more. So, 60’s and sunny could be as good as 70’s with no sun. I have been waiting for highs in the 70s or 80s for peaches but am going to change that this year to also include highs in the 60s and sunny. Also it doesn’t have to be a good temp every day, I’m not sure how many days you need but if there are two good days in the 4-day window after grafting that may be enough.
I can’t imagine doing that, it seems like the cuts would be too coarse and not at a great enough angle. But, its clearly working…
The angle was the hardest part. Making the cut (as well as holding it together while binding) was easiest for the largest wood. Which is good, as those are the grafts that are harder (though workable) with clefts.
Probably more for me, given that I used black electrical tape (Temflex 2155).
I have some black tar tree wound spray I sometimes put on for a similar reason… then if it gets too hot I cover with aluminum foil.
I didn’t actually use it for that reason (to heat things up). If that is why it is working, it is just a happy coincidence. I like how tight I can pull it, yet the tree can still break though the rubber tape through natural growth.
Back when I used green plastic garden ties, I wasn’t very good about removing them- I still found some last summer, even though I hadn’t used it for 2 years…Shockingly, the grafts weren’t too badly mangled. It would have been much worse if it was a fast growing graft, rather than dwarf apples.
it is easier to graft to a stock that is bigger diameter than the scion rather than the other way around. I have used whip and tongue even when the scion is three times smaller than the stock, and that’s the most mismatched diameter I can do whip and tongue, aligning on one side. I can also do whip and tongue even if the scion is twice as big as my maximum limit of mismatch that I can comfortably do without taking a hit in success rates, beyond which I resort to chip budding when the barks aren’t slipping or to T-budding when the barks are slipping.
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Bob,
Is the Temflex wrapped over the scions’s buds?Brady