What one is it your looking for?

It is difficult to tell from your post why you want to graft your peach onto a rootstock. Is it a rare variety you are trying to maintain? Most California peaches are grafted onto Nemaguard rootstock, some onto Citation for dwarfing. Check with www.BayLaurelNursery.com for rootstock availability. Al

I want to make my own multi-grafted peach, with my own choices of grafts. I don't have enough room to grow a whole tree of every kind of peach I want. And since grafting on to the peaches I already have doesn't seem to be working, I thought I might have an easier time with a younger, rootstock tree.

Thanks
Carla in Sac

Carla:

Have you tried T budding? It's a lot easier than most grafting. But I had good luck this spring using whip&tongue for peach and plum. I had dormant cuttings and grafted as the stock started growing.

I did my own multi budded trees on Citation in 2003 before moving to TX. Citation gave me beautiful near 90 degree branch angles. My trees looked much better than the $50 multi-grafts I've bought. Trouble is I don't know where you can buy Citation. That's a shame when Dave Wilson and Zaiger are just down the road.

You should be able to find Lovell somewhere.

THe Fruitnut

Carla:

Why not buy a tree at a nursery of a new variety that you'd like. Choose one that has 4-6 branches with good angles at about 18 inches. Then T bud your varieties on all but one of the branches. You could do the budding staring about mid May and force them two weeks later. If they fail, rebud in August and force the next spring. This would give you a new variety and a strong tree. Four varieties per tree is ideal and six is maximum.

Citation should be a good rootstock for your area. I like it because of the strong anchorage, large sweet fruit, and early maturity.

The Fruitnut

T-budding is what I just tried, they all failed. I put them both on little branches, and also on the main trunk. My spring cleft grafts all failed too. I wish I could watch someone in person, because clearly I'm not getting it from the photos. Or I guess I am, because my apple, cherry and apricot grafts all lived! But peaches and nectarines are the fruit I want the most! Waaah!

Carla in Sac

Hi Carla-
Does this video help? See link below.
-Glenn

Here is a link that might be useful: T-Bud & Chip Bud Grafting Techniques

Carla:

Peach, nectarine and apricot are harder to T-bud than apple or cherry because the bark is thinner and more fragile. The guy in the video was rather ham handed in my opinion. Doing the T-bud he tore up the bark on the rootstock. I open the T with my thumbnail a small amount, just enough to get the bud to slid in from the top. You don't open up the T and ploop the bud in place, you slid it in from the top. I also take the wood out of the bud. This helps the bud slid in easier but is only essential on small diameter wood where it gives a much better fit of cambium layers. Then I wrap with rubber budding strips. They work great.

Key point: bark MUST BE SLIPPING on the rootstock to T-bud. If you need to remove the wood from the bud, then bark must be slipping on the scion. It takes a certain amount of dexterity to fit everything together with minimum damage to bark, cambium, and bud. If the bark isn't slipping well, things get tore up and the cambium layer isn't fully exposed. In that case I quit and give the tree a good watering. Water is the key to T-budding because that is what causes the bark to slip.

I get ~95% takes on T budding even with the stonefruit and with small diameter wood, the hardest to work with. I got about 85-90% takes on whip and tongue this spring.

Experience is the best teacher so keep trying.

The Fruitnut

You may have a tough time getting peach rootstock this year. I have heard from a number of experts, while trying to find an old variety for myself, that it is a bad year for peaches. Apparently a freeze killed most of the stock. Even Cummins had no peaches and is trying to acquire them from Tennessee.

I looked at Fedco, but it seems they only have one type: "Prunus americana (Plum) Seedling rootstock for American, Japanese or hybrid plums. Also recommended for grafting peaches. Seedling plum produces very decent 1" fruit without grafting. The best pollinator for hybrid
plums. See explanation in plum section on page 19. Z3. (1/4" caliper) 1384 Prunus americana, bundle of 10, $18.00"

Carla look up the local chapter of California Rare Fruit Growers at www.crfg.org. They regularly offer grafting/budding demonstrations and many members are willing to offer their help when asked. Al

Carla, check out the link below. The CRFG will be having scion exchanges this month. Hundreds of different varieties of scion wood. Lot's of fun to attend these. Kern

http://www.crfg.org/chapters/golden_gate/other_2009_scion_exchanges.html

Cool, thanks!

Carla in Sac

I was a nurseryman for a while.
We only did chip budding, there is no need to peel back bark.
Its simple quick and has a great success rate.
You only need to do two cuts one below the bud and one down the back of the bud.
The cut below the bud goes a bit into the hard wood, down at an angle, then you cut down the back of the bud until that cut meets up with your first cut.
You have a little chip with a bit of wood still attached.
Just do the exact same cut in your rootstock stem and fit the chip in.
Tape over the whole bud with PVC tape.
We did most of our buds in late summer and left them covered until spring, when we cut the tape and the tops off.
If you do this budding in spring, you have to leave the tape on for about two weeks, (as long as your rootstock is actively growing)
I lost too many stocks by budding in spring, so I changed to dormant buds in the late summer.

(yes a picture would have explained it much better)

Some varieties need the budwood to be treated with a copper spray before budding, because they can get a bacterial infection under the tapes.
(it cost me a lot of money to learn that one)

Yes, Mike, I had to read it three times before the picture sprang into my mind!
But thanks, maybe I'll try it again when my trees wake up, and use some copper. Maybe that is what the problem has been!

Carla in Sac

Carla;
If you need Nemaguard rootstock let us know, I've been told I'm the only nursery in Arizona that grows fruit trees from seed. We propagate most of our own trees, sometimes we have to by in from other places,... but if you want some rootstock shoot me a mail or contact me on my web site. I have around 750/800 1/4" seedlings.

Here is a link that might be useful: RSI Growers