Another hairbrain apple idea - Interstem

[yoderjac]

As many know, I've been experimenting growing apples from seed. The idea is to introduce some genetic variability into my permaculture. The odds of getting a productive apple are not great. My first attempt was to plant the seedlings in the field and then graft them to known varieties leaving some lower branches of the original tree. The idea was to ensure that the trees are productive while seeing what the seedlings can produce on their own. If one of the lower branches produces a good wildlife apple, I can then use that branch for future grafting. ...Well, that was the idea. Details are here: http://www.habitat-talk.com/index.php?threads/starting-apples-from-seed-indoors-how-to.6613/

The issues I've found so far.

• Seedlings started in the winter don't generally have sufficient roots to push scions. While my most vigorous seedling accepted scions, most didn't. Also, if you bench graft them, you lose the lower limbs of the original tree which was the point of starting from seed.
• Leaving nurse branches when field grafting young trees tends to make the tree want to push new growth rather than feed the scion. Some of this may be due to different leaf-out times. At any rate field grafting success was poor.
• When I overwinter the seedlings and bench graft the second spring, I've had good success in graft takes where I have a match between rootstock and scion diameter but poor success with mismatched grafting techniques. Again, bench grafting means you lose the lower limbs.

Hair brained idea:

How about interstem grafting? This would be a non-traditional use. What if I took M111 (appropriate clonal rootstock for my clay soil) and took scions from my seedlings and grafted them to the m111. This should give me a semi-dwarf tree. I could grow these out for a year in containers, over winter them and then bench graft them high with a known variety. This interstem of my seedlings could then produce the lower branches.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Turkey Creek]

IMO you wont get enough growth from your interstem in a years time for them to produce your lowest permanent branches on your trees. Unless you want permanent branches in the at 3-4' height?

 

[chickenlittle]

My suggestion would be to make this project simpler instead of more complicated. Why not just plant the seedlings out and wait for them to fruit before deciding to do something else? If you like the fruit, you can leave the tree. Or top work it if you don't. It takes a long time to evaluate but much less effort from you.

If you really want to accelerate evaluating the fruit, you can graft immature seedling scion onto something else but M111 would be about my last choice in terms of precocity. Instead, do fully dwarfing stock like Bud9 or G11. You'd need to fence those but you can plant on 3ft spacing. Another idea is to plant your seedlings at high density in a fenced area until they fruit. This photo below from the USDA Geneva shows their seedling evaluation blocks with trees planted in double rows, about 6ft between rows and about 3ft between trees. They'll eventually remove them and only retain scions from the most promising trees. Again, it would take longer until they fruit but not much effort on your part other than fencing them until they are big enough.

 

[DLH]

How are you doing your field grafting? If you are doing cleft or bark grafting would chip or t budding be better? You only need one bud and could graft higher on the tree with smaller diameter trees. Best I can tell chip budding can be done in spring or summer I’m going to try it this spring for dormant grafting. I like chicken little’s idea of bud 9 or Geneva 11 so yo can see what the fruit will be like quicker. You could do a interstem of something precious like g30 onto m111 then seedling then final variety. This may end up a bigger wildlife size tree with earlier fruiting but that’s a lot of grafting to do plus who knows how it would work.

 

[yoderjac]

Good points! Turkey Creek, I'm not expecting production quickly at all from a seedling, probably years, but you make a good point about height. The seedlings I grafted in the field I grafted between 5' and 6' the first year. I mostly used whip and tongue grafts for that because the tree size was such that it was an easy diameter match with my scions.

What I didn't think through was that if I graft to m111, they likely would not be that tall after one season. So, if I do try interstem, I might want to grow the m111 for 1 season and graft higher in year 2 so that when I do the final graft the seedling branches will be higher.

Chickenlittle,

Interesting approach. I wonder how bud9 or g11 would do in my heavy clay. I guess another approach would be to simply grow the bud9 or g11 grafts in my containers and never put them in the field. They would probably fruit faster in my rootmakers with good care at home. Once I evaluate the fruit, I could simply use the good ones as a scion source for M111 and discard (or regraft) the rest.

Got me thinking...

DLH,

Another interesting thought. This wasn't the way I was thinking of using interstem but it would solve soil issues with rootstock since m111 would be in the ground. This might be an interesting thing to do as in independent project with know varieties. My results with budding have been very poor so far.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[DLH]

You could also just graft varieties that you want onto m111 and put them in there final location. Then keep your seedlings grown at home as a scion bank and field graft a limb or two per tree at their final location. You could change that seedling grafted branch later if needed while still having clonal rootstock with known varieties. Are you wanting seedling roots too or is clonal rootstock fine?

 

[yoderjac]

You could also just graft varieties that you want onto m111 and put them in there final location. Then keep your seedlings grown at home as a scion bank and field graft a limb or two per tree at their final location. You could change that seedling grafted branch later if needed while still having clonal rootstock with known varieties. Are you wanting seedling roots too or is clonal rootstock fine?

Well, I'm torn on that. What I'm looking for is adding genetic diversity while still producing good wildlife trees. I have some seedlings that I just planted and will let go. I have some named varieties grafted to M111. My thinking is this:

When we crossbred and select apples for commercial use and then propagate them with grafting, we create a genetically stagnant pool of trees. They are generally clustered in orchards. As disease and predators move forward through sexual reproduction, they adapt. What better target to adapt to than a pool of trees that can't play the cat and mouse game because they are locked. To my way of thinking, that is why apples are so high maintenance. All the spraying and such is to compensate for the genetic limitation.

So, I view the vintage apples as less of an issue than most modern apples. There are simply fewer targets of opportunity for disease and insects. That is probably why we find them somewhat more disease resistant than many modern apples. I see clonal rootstock in the same way but less critical. While apple varieties were largely bred for commercial fruiting characteristics, rootstock was more initially bred for dwarfing qualities as well as disease resistance. So in the long run, I think I'd like to have unique varieties of wildlife apples growing on their own roots.

Having said that, if I'm able to identify seedlings with characteristics I like, getting them on their own roots is easy. You can simply graft to clonal rootstock upside down and plant them with the graft below the soil. The master grafter in a class I took taught me this trick. The upside down root system will support the tree long enough for it to produce its own roots. Since it is upside down, the rootstock will eventually and the tree will be completely on its own roots.

I don't have any issue with having any combination.

This is sort of an early sounding board for thinking things through.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[sandbur]

Jack, I admire your ingenuity and ambition, but the process is too complicated for me.

For my climate, I would first plant a clonal rootstock and a seedling rootstock that I like in their final location. My seedling rootstock would’ve dolgo or a wild crab , Columbia crab if you can find it.

Then start some seedlings from a wild tree that you like. Discard any slow going seedlings or those with disease issues.

Topwork the promising seedlings onto the established clonal rootstock or onto established seedling rootstock that is definitely a bird sized crab.

Burns definition is any crab over 3/4 inch and disease free is a Deer crab. Less than 3/4 inch is a bird crab and better served as a rootstock.

My interest is mainly in Deer crabs as they tend to be more hardy, will fruit every year or every other year with minimal pruning, and often free of significant disease. Some even just taste great.

You can look at fruit buds or even other buds and often judge if it will be a Deer crab or a bird crab. Bird crabs have smaller buds.


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[sandbur]

There is a guy on Facebook that I used to follow. He would deliberately crossbreed certain apples by hand, grow seedlings, and topwork them to evaluate them. I think he went by the handle of Turkey Song, but has now changed it. Maybe on you tube where he also evaluated edible crabs that he topworked onto Frankenstein trees.


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[Mahindra3016]

There is a guy on Facebook that I used to follow. He would deliberately crossbreed certain apples by hand, grow seedlings, and topwork them to evaluate them. I think he went by the handle of Turkey Song, but has now changed it. Maybe on you tube where he also evaluated edible crabs that he topworked onto Frankenstein trees.


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I think you may be talking about the guy that goes by the name Skillcult, Long Dred lock hair dew?

 

[wooduck]

To speed research breeding programs use fully dwarf root systems to bring fruit fast the evaluate and graft winners over to more permanent roots , so to speed the selection process bud 9 would help you , when you decide a direction graft out scions to your chosen root system

 

[sandbur]

There is a guy on Facebook that I used to follow. He would deliberately crossbreed certain apples by hand, grow seedlings, and topwork them to evaluate them. I think he went by the handle of Turkey Song, but has now changed it. Maybe on you tube where he also evaluated edible crabs that he topworked onto Frankenstein trees.


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I think you may be talking about the guy that goes by the name Skillcult, Long Dred lock hair dew?

That’s him.


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[yoderjac]

Yep, I'm known for biting off more than I can chew. This thread has been very informative and will undoubtedly influence how I move forward. I'm still not sure exactly how I will proceed but there are a lot of good ideas here!

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

I don't have a clear path forward yet, but here is what I've done based on this thread. I just ordered 5 B.9 rootstock from Cummins. I plan to pot them up in RB2 containers and grow them on my deck. I'll never plant them in the field. I just use them to evaluate seedling fruit. I'm guessing the combination of the dwarfing rootstock with the root ball size constriction of the containers will help with early fruiting even though the scions will come from seedlings not producing trees.

This opens up even more opportunities. Once grafts have clearly taken on my bench grafted seedlings, if I get new growth below the graft, I will leave one branch or two. I'll remove when they are dormant for scions. I hope to get to the farm this week. I'll pull scions from fielded seedlings if they are still dormant but with the warm week we had, I'm not optimistic. If I have no seedling scions to graft to the B.9 this year, I'll just growth the rootstock out in the containers and graft next year.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

I received the Bud9 rootstock from Cummins today. I had taken scions from three of the seedlings in the field below the graft last week. Unfortunately I did not start this thread before I attempted grafting all the containerized seedlings. I would have saved the cuttings. Some of the containerize seedling grafts that took have growth below the graft so I'll leave one branch to become a scion next year. Many of the containerize seedlings that failed have put up new growth below the failed graft. I'll let those grow out during the summer and become scions next spring as well for the Bud9.

After grafting those three seedling scions to the Bud9, I planted them in 1 gal RB2s along with the two Bud9 that I have not grafted yet. It will be interesting to see how quickly these seedling scions produce fruit on the Bud9 on my deck for evaluation.

I put the ungrafted Bud9 in my cold room in case I find seedling scions from other trees in the field. I put the grafted bud9 under lights.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[wooduck]

With moderate growth you may see a little bloom in 12 months depending on variety grafted to top , I would bet two seasons on the bud 9 and all will flower some . We have had to remove fruit from scion wood 18 inches tall above a graft union in 12 months , support with plant tye , bamboo stake , leave one fruit when they size to dime size and you will have a sample that fast

 

[sandbur]

With moderate growth you may see a little bloom in 12 months depending on variety grafted to top , I would bet two seasons on the bud 9 and all will flower some . We have had to remove fruit from scion wood 18 inches tall above a graft union in 12 months , support with plant tye , bamboo stake , leave one fruit when they size to dime size and you will have a sample that fast

Golden Hornet on dolgo rootstock was blooming shortly after grafting and bloomed the next two years as well. This last year I allowed it to carry a few apples.


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[TreeDaddy]

You apple fellas never cease to amaze with your knowledge on the subject

Its like a different language

bill

 

[yoderjac]

With moderate growth you may see a little bloom in 12 months depending on variety grafted to top , I would bet two seasons on the bud 9 and all will flower some . We have had to remove fruit from scion wood 18 inches tall above a graft union in 12 months , support with plant tye , bamboo stake , leave one fruit when they size to dime size and you will have a sample that fast

Thanks. I think that is the typical expectation but this is kind of a special case. Normally the scions come from a mature fruiting tree. There are some hormonal changes that take place as the tree matures and the grafted scion has these hormones. In this case, the scions are coming from year old seedlings that have never fruited and are not close. That factor goes in favor of later fruiting. On the other hand, in the normal case, the root stock is planted in the field where the roots have full freedom. In my case, these are containerized so the roots are constricted. Constricting roots can force a seedling tree into a fruiting state early. This favor goes in favor of earlier fruiting but may be offset because this is clonal rootstock not a seedling.

So, I'm not sure quite what to expect in this case. Good idea about pinching off all but one fruit!

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

Golden Hornet on dolgo rootstock was blooming shortly after grafting and bloomed the next two years as well. This last year I allowed it to carry a few apples.


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I had that happen to several of my seedling grafts this spring. I immediately cut off the blooms before the flowers could open to drive more vegetative growth. I'll have to check to see if it was a single variety of apple scion that did this or several varieties.

Thanks,

Jack