Whip & tongue graft union

Whip & tongue graft union. Field grafted domestic plum on Prunus virginiana at nine weeks. This year my hobby experiment as an aside to our nursery has been to explore graft compatibility with wild rootstocks, include the P. virginiana and A. alnifolia around our property. So far results have been better than expected. At the very minimum we have a surplus of scion wood for bud grafting our mustang rootstocks this month and dormant plum, pear and apple scions next year’s grafting season. Best case these are long lived, or a more tempered expectation is that some of them will out preform others. A range of grafting techniques, timing, rootstock / frame tree size, and caliper were selected. Two dozen zone 3 hardy plum, a dozen pear and as many apple were grafted all around to see how well they would grow and collect real data on compatibility. So far in the first season we’re seeing vigorous healthy growth across the board. #grafting