GRAFTING. Grafting is the uniting, of a shoot or scion containing one or more buds to a stock or root with a view, by their union, to produce a superior fruit upon the inferior stalk. There are a number of ways of grafting, cleft grafting being the mode usually adopted. This is simply splitting a stock, first sawed off square, and inserting on each side a scion tapered down to a thin, wedge-shape, with a sharp knife, so the inner bark of the scion and stock will jnst meet. To insure this meeting at some point the top of the graft is sometimes carried in slightly. The whole is then covered with grafting wax to exclude moisture and air, and the grafts usually take kindly, if the grafting be done at the right season of the year, that is in the spring before the leaves appear. Root grafting is performed in precisely the same manner as stock grafting pieces of root being used as the stock. This may be done late in winter, the roots having been carefully saved in moist earth in a cool cellar for this purpose. The grafts may be cut any time in mild weather in winter, tied in small bundles, and kept in moist sand until wanted. The only tools for grafting, on the farm, is a sharp, panel saw, a keen pocket knife, for paring the stocks and sharpening the grafts, a butcher knife, and a mallet for splitting the stocks, and grafting wax for spreading over the mutilated parts. Saddle grafting is used only with stocks of a size corresponding with that of the grafts. The accompanying cuts show this manner of graft- ing; a being stock and graft each other,o thunited.
er b Sometimes the stock is sim ply pared to a thin wedge and the scion simply split and wedged on, but this is a very crude and shift less way of In either of the operations of grafting described the whole exposed surface should be well waxed with grafting wax,to keep out water. An other commnn mode of grafting is by approach, or in arching, as it is termed. A modification of this is practiced where the bark of a valuable tree has been in or gnawed by mice. he injury is pared smooth at the edges of the bark down to the live wood, and a piece of healthy bark fitted accurately thereto, and covered with grafting wax until it is healed; or scions set close together and brought fresh bark to fresh bark at top and bottom, and securely fastened. Dr. Warder, in American Pomolog.y, in rela tion to grafting old orchards, and upon root grafting, writes: Old orchards of inferior fruit may be entirely re-made and re-formed by graft ing the limbs with such varieties as 'we may desire. A. new life is by this process often infused into the trees, which is due to the very severe pruning which the trees then receive; they are consequently soon covered with a vig orous growth of young healthy wood, which replaces the decrepid and often decaying spray that accumulates in an old orchard, and the fruit produced for several years by the new growth is not only more valuable in kind, according to the judgment used in the selection of grafts, but it is more fair, smooth and healthy, and of better size than that which was previously furnished by the trees. Certain vari eties are brought at once into bearing when thus top-grafted, which would have been long in developing their fruitful condition if planted as nursery trees. Others are always better and finer when so worked, than on young trees. In renewing an old orchard by grafting its head, it will not be a good plan to attempt the whole tree at once; the pruning would be too severe, and would be followed by a profusion of succu• lent shoots breaking out from the large branches, such as are called water-sprouts. Those who have practiced most, prefer at first, to remove about one-third of the limbs for grafting, and those should be selected at the top of the tree. The new growth thus has an open field for its development, and the lower limbs will be invi,g orated, while they tend also to preserve the equi librium of the tree in a double sense, physically and physiologically. The next year another third of the limbs may be grafted, and the remainder the year following, as practiced by Mr. Geo. Olmstead, of Connecticut, who, on the sixth year from the first grafting, harvested twenty-eight and one-half bushels of choice •apples from a single tree that was seventy-five years old, and which before only produced infe rior fruit. J. J. Thomas recommends to give a well-shaped head to such newly formed trees, and to prevent the branches from shooting upward in a close body near the center of the tree, that the old horizontal boughs should be allowed to extend to a distance in each direction, while the upright ones should be lopped. The
same writer also advises, instead of cutting off large branches and grafting them at once, it is better to prune the top in part, which will cause an emission of vigorous shoots. These are then either budded, or grafted. And as the grafts gradually extend by growth, the remainder of the top may, by successive excisions, be removed. The illustrations we give will show the series of operations in grafting in its various stages: a is a stick of buds ready for working; b, section of graft pared; c, stock cleft and wedged open with wooden wedge; d, same, with graft inserted; e, stock with graft set on each side; f, cross section of stock and graft showing exact meeting of inner bark, a most essential qualification. Grafting in the nursery is, or should be, either done at or near the collar of the stock, or it is performed in-doors upon the roots or sections of means of multiplying fruit trees. It is a sort of machinery, with division of labor, and appli ances, that enable the operators to turn out immense numbers. Machinery has indeed been applied to the business; we have grafting appa ratus to facilitate the work. The Minkler machine consists of a frame or gauge which regulates the angle of the slope, which is cut with a broad chisel that reduces the roots and scions to a condition for putting them together; by its use an immense number of grafts can cut, and another hand binds them together with the waxed thread, without any tie. Mr. Robey's., machine consists of a complicated shears to cut the slope and tongue at one operation, preparing the pieces for whip grafting. Mr. S. S. son, of Cincinnati, has also invented an appa ratus for this purpose, which proves to be very useful. In root grafting the methods of per-. forming the operation vary somewhat, but all agree in the object to be attained: the co-apta-. tion of the scion with a piece of root. Some.. grafters use only the upper portion of the root, thinking the original collar of the seedling stock, the only point at which the most perfect and.. successful union between the aerial and tenets-. trial portions of 'trees should or can be effected —theoretically this may be very well, but the. practice constantly pursued, in myriads of eases, abundantly proves that the grafting need not be. restricted to this part, and that a perfect union may be effected at any point of the root, and that this may even be inverted. The common, practice has been to take two or more cuts from, the root, when of sufficient size and length. For root grafting, thrifty stocks are wanted of one or two years growth, the smoother and the roots, the better. These should be taken from the seed-bed in the fall, selected, tied in bundles, and stored in the cellar or cave, or buried, in the soil where they shall be accessible at any time, and where they will be kept fresh and plump. The roots and scions having been pre pared and under shelter, the work of grafting may proceed at any time during the winter. The stocks, if not clean, should be washed, and one hand trims off the side rootlets. The grafter cuts a hundred scions of the appropriate length, which he puts into a shallow box on the table; he takes up a stock, cut the slope near the collar, and a dextrous hand will at the same time make the slop- . ing cut to receive the first graft and also the tongue, if that style of grafting is to be done, as is usually practiced. He then picks up a scion, from a lot which himself or another hand has already pre pared with a slope and tongue, and adapts it to the root, the tongue keeping the two together; a portion of the root is then cut off with the graft, and the process is repeated upon the next section. Two or three or more grafts, are thus made from one seedling root; the length of the sections vary from two to four inches, according to the fancy of the operator, or of his employer. Some per sons recommend a long scion with a short root and others prefer to reverse those terms. The whole root graft should not. be more than six or seven inches long. When any given number of scions are fitted to the roots, a boy completes the process of grafting, by applying melted wax with a brush, in which ease they are dropped into water to harden the wax, or they are wrapped with waxed strips of muslin or paper, or, better still, they are tied with waxed thread. No. 3 cotton yarn is drawn through a pan of melted wax, and wound upon a reel placed at the other side of the room, so that the wax may harden, This makes a convenient tie; the graft being held in the left hand, the thread is quickly and easily wound.