What is the purpose of grafting tomatoes in the first place?

Thanks,

Vivian

A good root stock can add vigor plus disease and nematode resistance to a good tasting fruit.

From the picture it does appear that your assumptions are correct. My question is why bother to go to the trouble with rootstock from "normal" varieties? I'll admit that I did the same with SunSugar as rootstock because I had a theory that this variety rootstock was an aggressive grower. Sun Gold is very similar. But I had grafted Trust, Big Beef and Geronimo scions onto Maxifort rootstock in an effort to improve their performance. If you are going to the bother I'd suggest that you use the most dependable (rootborne disease resistance and agressive growing) rootstock that you can find. Otherwise you are just tinkering.

That is really neat. I didn't know you could graft tomatoes like that.

What would happen if you grafted an indeterminate to a determinate stock and vice-versa? Would it be the graft that determines what the plant will be?

Vivian

First graft goes to a sucker, which grows in the crotch between the main stem and a true branch. Such a sucker would develop to a secondary leader and likely bear many fruit if left on the plant. The second graft would then go onto the main leader, somewhat above the graft to the sucker.

Conceivably, more than two grafts could be done to a plant using this approach.

I've heard of people grafting a tomato plant with potato roots to get both potatoes and tomatoes from the same plant. Never tried it myself however.

Here is a link that might be useful: Here's the link