Nut Growing (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1921 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER II GRAFTING A Review of the history and literature of tree grafting would seem to indicate that very little has been added to our knowledge of the subject for more than a century. Authors have complimented other authors by accepting their views. They have described clever variations in technique but without adding new principles in the abstract. In this chapter will be found material which promises to revolutionize the whole subject. At the beginning of the twentieth century even so famous a grafter as Mr. Jackson Dawson, of the Arnold Arboretum, had failed with the hickories excepting with a few small specimens grafted under hothouse conditions. At the present time, twenty years later, almost any bright youth may now graft hickory trees in the open almost as readily as apple trees are propagated. Yesterday scions for the coming season's work were cut and stored while buds of the cuttings were dormant. To-day we may cut a scion directly from one tree and place it immediately in another tree at almost any time during the summer in temperate climates. Perhaps it may be well to add to our nomenclature by speaking of this latter method as immediate grafting, while the older method may be called mediate grafting. Mediate grafting may continue to be the chief method, but immediate grafting in my experimental work promises to have a field of its own. The textbooks describe budding and grafting as separate subjects. This leads to some confusion. It seems better to speak of scion grafting and bud grafting, because budding is really a form of grafting and the material in both instances is taken from the same sort of cuttings. The time for cutting scions for mediate grafting will depend much upon the climate of a locality. In northern...