Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 41st Annual Meeting Part 35

MR. KINTZEL: Rubber tape?

MR. BERNATH: No, no, cloth.

MR. STOKE: That's about the same as surgical tape?

MR. BERNATH: Made especially for grafting, Mr. Stoke.

Now, you have to watch it closely because this is a tricky thing.

MR. CORSAN: This is not called Scotch Tape?

MR. BERNATH: No, this is made especially for grafting. You can get this from some of the boys.

MR. WEBER: A. M. Leonard and Son, Piqua, Ohio.

MR. RICK: That will require more attention than the rubber. The rubber takes care of itself, where this one you have to take off.

MR. WEBER: No, this decays.

MR. BERNATH: You start right here on the stock. Now you make sure that the scion--

MR. WEBER: You start at the top?

MR. BERNATH: The top, always on the top.

MR. WEBER: And that has a tendency to keep the scion worked down, whereas if you started at the bottom you might push it up.

MR. BERNATH: You have quite a pressure right around there--watch it, because it will tear, and if it tears with you, why, it's so hard to get straightened out--and then press together.

MR. WEBER: And you don't wax either the top, or anything?

MR. BERNATH: No. Now, the reason for leaving this under stock that long: if you are not careful, fungus growth will set in. If you cut right here, then the whole thing is affected with it, see. Wrap it firmly and that is there on both sides, and when the union forms and the growth begins here, when you take them out of the case, for instance, now, you take a sharp pair of shears and cut as close as you can. (Removes top of understock.) Never mind if you cut the cloth, it doesn't make any difference. Just cut it right there. Snip it right off. But that is when you take them out of the grafting case.

A MEMBER: Wouldn't it also be all right to leave that stub on to tie your sprout to so it won't want to break?

MR. BERNATH: No, you might be better off if you had a stake. Put a stake on the side of it. When everything is right that surface will callus over right quickly. It may not seem so. It does make a perfect union unlike a graft of some other types.

MR. WEBER: When you make that cut of the excess understock, you don't even wax?

MR. BERNATH: No. You can if you want to, but I don't wax. Just leave it like that.

Now the next operation. Here is this miniature greenhouse. It's moist peat. That's just about the right substance. Would anybody like to look at this? Don't get it too wet. Just walk right up here.

MR. WEBER: It feels as if it's ground up.

MR. BERNATH: It is.

MR. CORSAN: Mr. Bernath, would that be the right stuff to put sweet chestnuts in in the fall?

MR. BERNATH: You mean for sprouting?

MR. CORSAN: Yes.

MR. BERNATH: That would be all right.

MR. CORSAN: That's not too damp?

MR. BERNATH: No.

MR. CORSAN: I have put it in that and had the greatest success.

MR. CHASE: Now, folks, let's everybody sit down, and please keep quiet and try to absorb what's going on here. We can't have 10 or 15 individual conversations going on.

MR. BERNATH: Now here we have two pots grafted. Now, of course, the bench in the greenhouse is wider and longer. Here is what you do. You start the first row, just move the peat back like that, and you lay them in like that, one after the other, the pots on the side.

MR. WEBER: With the bud side up?

MR. BERNATH: That's right. Now, you go right along. When you come to the next row, here is what you do (piling up peat) like that. If you want to cover the scion, all right; if you don't, perfectly all right. You can put electric heating coils under it.

MR. RICK: Is there any advantage in sloping the top? Would it matter if it was flat?

MR. BERNATH: No, no, doesn't matter. This just happened to be an old melon box. I had started melons early in the spring.

Now, while the grafts are in the process of forming the unions, that is, when the cambium begins to form, you do not water until you take these out of the case. Add no more water, but make sure your pots are moist enough. For instance, in this one, there is plenty of moisture for the period of incubation.

MR. KINTZEL: How long? Couple of weeks?

MR. BERNATH: No. Sometimes they start to grow in three weeks, but generally four weeks, maybe a little over. Sometimes less; depends on everything.

MR. SHERMAN: What temperature in the greenhouse?

MR. BERNATH: Well, if you note in the springtime when the trees are beginning to grow, you know the night temperature goes down, while daytime may go up to 75, 80 in the spring. All right, you follow nature, and you'll never go wrong.

Now, the temperature, at night, if it does go down around the fifties, or even less, doesn't do any harm. That's the house temperature. But under the benches where you have your heat coils, that's of course, at least 60, maybe a little better, and, of course, in daytime it may--well, it's all right if it goes up to 70, 75. Then, of course, you have to ventilate through the house, and as a matter of fact, under the benches. Take a lot of bags and nail them along the walk to keep the heat under the benches. That gives you the bottom heat.

Now, as I understand, some of our members have tried this method, but they applied too much heat. They burned them. If they didn't burn them, fungus growth set in, because there's high humidity in that box. You will see the moisture condensation on the gla.s.s. Drops of water acc.u.mulate, and that's a thing you will have to guard against. So every morning give it at first about a 5-minute period when you take a dry cloth and wipe the surface moisture off the gla.s.s, the under side, to prevent the water from dripping on the unions here, to keep it dry. Then as you go along you can increase that period, but not over 15 minutes, until around the fourth week, you can generally put a stick under the gla.s.s to give more ventilation. When you see that the union is formed and everything is all right, take the gla.s.s off, take your grafts out and stand them up straight, and from there on you can water them, but not before.

And then you cut these stocks off right there as close as you can get it, sort of an upward movement, like that (demonstrating with knife).

MR. WEBER: It doesn't make any difference if you cut the rubber band that's on it or not?

MR. BERNATH: No, not too much, if it's callused up good, if the union is hard enough. And then, of course, you put the gla.s.s on, and then you keep these grafts in the greenhouse. But don't forget now, something that is important, when you graft these. Here we have a greenhouse over us. This little box represents the batch of grafts. Don't forget you have to shade them. If you didn't shade these, they would burn to a crisp. I have lost several hundred blue spruce grafts by going away on a day when it was cloudy and I forgot to tell Mrs. Bernath, "If the sun comes out, raise the sash." When I came home, this part of the greenhouse was shaded; now, in this corner here I think it was around 250 beautiful grafts but the next day I was going to take them out. They were burnt to a crisp. I saved a few trees right where it was shady.

MR. CALDWELL: The blue spruce are grafted by the same method?

MR. BERNATH: Yes, I use this method for inside grafting for everything.

MR. CALDWELL: Use this method for s.h.a.gbarks the same way?