Grafted Plants

[tache]

Territorial has grafted plants. It seems a little weird to me. I guess I think of grafting as something big and woody.(Maybe politicians who do it could be soft and green and slimy). I suppose the seeds would come true to the grated on plant?

I would do just about anything to get more than one or two Brandywines a year. Has anyone done this?

[laspasturas]

I've been wanting to try it, but haven't yet. Here is a link to a really interesting video about how it's done.

[Gobig_or_Gohome_toms]

Here is a long thread where it was discussed about them selling grafted plants when the catelogs first went out this year:
http://www.tomatoville.com/showthrea...light=grafting

Craig

[Dutch]

I am going to do some experimenting with tomato grafting this spring. I intend to start my seedlings in mid March. I have Multifort and Emperador root stock seeds. I also have the 1.5mm, 2.0mm and 2.5mm grafting clips.

If I am successful in my grafting attempts, I would like to get some of my plants to someone like Carol at Knapps (Wi-sunflower) to grow out as an unbiased party. Her farm is less than an hour’s drive away from me.

So there are a few “ifs” and some unknowns, but we will see where this endeavor takes us.

Dutch

[tache]

Thanks so much for telling me about that film. I was getting a little edgy about using that bare razor. Then I saw his nicely bandaged hand and decided I'd just mozey up the the freeway to Territorial. If you have a chance could you keep us posted on your progress?

Craig, I'm going to check your link out now. Thanks for telling me. I should have known you would all be way ahead of me,

[acorn]

15 years ago in college I did an independent study for a couple of semesters for my Ag degree on an attempt to make hot tomatoes. Was never successful in that but along the way I did try some grafting of tomatoes to hot pepper root stock and vice versa with decent results. Considering I was going cross species I was pretty happy with any successful grafts and I got around a 33% success rate. It would be much easier with tomato to tomato grafts I would think. I was using a v-cut graft just below the cotyledons before the first true leaves emerged. Then some kind of grafting tape around the union and keeping in a high humidity controlled temp artificial lighted environment for around 10 days. I got the idea from an old book I found from the 1940s that talked about grafting tomato to potato rootstock. The peppers I got from the tomato rootstock plants were bigger than normal btw.

- Aaron

[salix]

Aaron, at what age/size was the grafting done? Surely not done on tiny seedlings 'before the first true leaves emerged' - was that an indication of location of graft or of an age of rootstock? Fascinating topic, and nice to have input from someone with hands-on experience.

[acorn]

Originally Posted by salix

Aaron, at what age/size was the grafting done? Surely not done on tiny seedlings 'before the first true leaves emerged' - was that an indication of location of graft or of an age of rootstock? Fascinating topic, and nice to have input from someone with hands-on experience.

It has been 15 or 16 years since I did this so forgive me if I am just a little fuzzy on all the details. However, upon further reflection the first set of leaves may have emerged. Cut was below the cotyledons (seed leaves) though. So seedlings were still pretty small. I found if I let them get much past that I couldn't get the grafts to take. Pretty much as soon as the stems started firming up it was a no go. Also at the university they had big environmentally controlled units for propagation. They were similiar in shape and size to large refrigerators with controllable lighting, humidity and temp. Those really helped alot but I don't think would be necessary. The diameter of the stem would be much smaller than a pencil, but bigger than thick spaghetti noodle for example. The key was to get the 2 donor plants to be pretty close to each other in the diameter of their stems in order for the cambium (growth) layers to line up. After the graft was made every effort was made not to stress the plant for a few days. Low light, high humidity, neutral temp like 70 deg F. If I end up with some extra seedlings this season I may give it a try again. Hope this helps.

- Aaron

[salix]

Thank you Aaron. So - younger seedlings than I imagined, and probably a job too fiddly for these arthritic old fingers!

[Dutch]

I have selected four open pollinated tomato varieties for the scions in my tomato grafting project. They are Ozark Pink VF, Mrs. Benson, Rose de Berne and Brandeva. Each will be grown three ways. The first will be without any graft at all. And then next will be grafted with a Multifort rootstock and than a third will be grafted with an Emperador rootstock.

[tache]

I put in an order at Territorial yesterday for a Brandywine grafted. If nothing else, this is going to be a really interesting year. Not that I can remember an uninteresting year of growing tomatoes.

Thank you, Aaron, for sharing your grafting project. The very thought of a hot spicey tomato is almost too much. How close are tomatoes and peppers?

[acorn]

Originally Posted by tache

I put in an order at Territorial yesterday for a Brandywine grafted. If nothing else, this is going to be a really interesting year. Not that I can remember an uninteresting year of growing tomatoes.

Thank you, Aaron, for sharing your grafting project. The very thought of a hot spicey tomato is almost too much. How close are tomatoes and peppers?

They are in the same plant family. Also in that family is eggplants, tobacco, potatoes, and nightshade. The hot tomato idea was for something like instant salsa on the vine for me. I did a little googling yesterday after posting about this stuff and it looks like someone else recently wrote a paper on grafting peppers with tomatoes. Also looks like the genes related to capsicum production were very recently isolated as well based on another paper I was able to dig up. So hot tomatoes is not necessarily out of the realm of possibility if someone had the right resources.

- Aaron

[tache]

Thanks again Aaron. Just the thought of hot spicey tomatoes will carry me to first red stupice. I don't really understand tho. At what point would any genetic be exchanged?
Tache

[acorn]

Originally Posted by tache

Thanks again Aaron. Just the thought of hot spicey tomatoes will carry me to first red stupice. I don't really understand tho. At what point would any genetic be exchanged?
Tache

Let me clarify, It would not be possible to interbreed a pepper plant with a tomato. They are too much different. It would be possible to insert the capsaicin producing gene into a tomato cell genome using modern genetic engineering techniques and grow that up into a plant with the new gene in it. It would be genetically modified food though. I wish I still had access to those kind of resources to give it a try.

btw sorry for taking this thread off track.

- Aaron

[tache]

Okay, I see or I sort of see. I'm very old and haven't gotten much beyond Mendel. You haven't gotten this thread off track. I started it and I wouldn't have known enough to imagine such an interesting discussion.