07-04-2007, 06:43 AM
I have developed a few opinions about various techniques after researching and trying some of them.
Air layering and rooting hardwood cuttings both develop roots from a callous that grows out of the cambium layer. As a result, the root ball develops from a ring around the branch. Plants with fibrous root balls tend to do well, but those that develop tap roots do not. They tend to be shallow rooted and not as drought tolerant. One technique used on deciduous plant cuttings is forcing the callous by over wintering them in a freeze proof location (sometimes buried in the ground). You can also wrap the cuttings in wet newspaper, place them in a plastic bag and put them in the vegetable bin of the refrigerator for several months. I have tried this with rose cuttings but failed because I let the cuttings dry out once I put them in soil. Forcing is used commercially for grape and olive propagation. It would be interesting to see if the technique could be adapted to tropicals but I expect air layering is better.
Trees can be stimulated to produce root suckers by digging around it and bruising the roots. The problem with root suckers is that most commercially bought trees are grafted onto root stock and you may not get the kind of fruit you want. It is a good way to get root stock that you can graft onto though.
Seeds work well with heirloom or naturalized trees but hybrids may revert to the characteristics of one of its parents. You can always use the plant for root stock and graft from a known host.
Grafting is useful for more than propagation. Even fruits that are self-pollinating will set more fruit if there are compatible pollinators nearby and one way to make sure of that is to graft different varieties on one tree. I can say from personal experience that it is easy to do on fruits from genus prunus (peaches, plums), pyrus (pears) and malus (apples).
Air layering and rooting hardwood cuttings both develop roots from a callous that grows out of the cambium layer. As a result, the root ball develops from a ring around the branch. Plants with fibrous root balls tend to do well, but those that develop tap roots do not. They tend to be shallow rooted and not as drought tolerant. One technique used on deciduous plant cuttings is forcing the callous by over wintering them in a freeze proof location (sometimes buried in the ground). You can also wrap the cuttings in wet newspaper, place them in a plastic bag and put them in the vegetable bin of the refrigerator for several months. I have tried this with rose cuttings but failed because I let the cuttings dry out once I put them in soil. Forcing is used commercially for grape and olive propagation. It would be interesting to see if the technique could be adapted to tropicals but I expect air layering is better.
Trees can be stimulated to produce root suckers by digging around it and bruising the roots. The problem with root suckers is that most commercially bought trees are grafted onto root stock and you may not get the kind of fruit you want. It is a good way to get root stock that you can graft onto though.
Seeds work well with heirloom or naturalized trees but hybrids may revert to the characteristics of one of its parents. You can always use the plant for root stock and graft from a known host.
Grafting is useful for more than propagation. Even fruits that are self-pollinating will set more fruit if there are compatible pollinators nearby and one way to make sure of that is to graft different varieties on one tree. I can say from personal experience that it is easy to do on fruits from genus prunus (peaches, plums), pyrus (pears) and malus (apples).
Larry