New (old) idea for new (old) grafting technique

Ok - so I saw this video recently about grafting multiple strains onto a single rootstock and how it would be useful for someone limited by plant count - to have a frankenmother plant with different branches giving different strain clones - thought "cool - but I don't need to do THAT..." Did a quick lookup in my Cervantes book and it pretty much said not a lot is known about grafting - did a bit more research in general horticulture apps its used to give certain plants a stronger root system (from another type of plant) and thought oh well I'll just leave it. But today I was chopping some stuff down and getting soil off the rootball to be reused and it hit me - why do we not graft clones onto existing (DEVELOPED) rootstock? So I'm sure everyone sees where I'm going with this - cut a clone and graft to a 5 gal root system - get a huge head start on growth. Has anyone tried this? Will it work? Has anyone grafted a frankenmother and willing to try for us for the sake of research? That was my last adult rootstock so I can't try for at least 3 months and may not be inclined to then because I'm just about too busy for a simple grow - let alone trying things that may not work - if this inspired anyone to try PLEASE post! Thanks - peace

I have wondered about this. It is commonplace in coffee where most arabica is grafted onto a robusta stock. Robusta is more durable but arabica tastes better.

I wonder how close in strain the graft and rootstock would have to be to be compatible.

I would think that a more sensative strain like a blueberry wouldn't make for a good rootstock.

And how well would sativas and indicas work when grafting together? You'd most likely need a really sturdy hybrid plant as your rootstock, so either sativa or indica could be grafted.

But then you have to wonder if the sativa grafts would outgrow the indica grafts on the same plant due to stretch, or would both grafts take on the quality of the rootstock in respect to stretch?

With an established rootstock, the grafted cuttings could possibly grow HUGE buds due to increased nutrient flow... But would the graft be able to hold allthat weight without snapping?

Now my minds racing with all kinds of questions I need answered! I've got a monster crop clone that just rooted, I'm still waiting on new growth to form, but once my clone becomes established and begins heavy branching, I'll try a few differant grafts and see what happens!!

I've done fruit trees, peppers and tomatoes. I don't think you will have compatibility issues unless you go to some serious extremes. (Worst case you will ever find I expect is that you may need a hybrid to serve as an 'interstem' on some extremes. Just a double graft with more compatible material in the middle.)

Here is the procedure for tomatoes should be perfect for weed too.
Start seeds or root cuttings for root stock.
Prepare 2" tube segments with one slit cut down the length. (sized to fit your plants tightly but without opening the slit).
Harvest cuttings (steep diagonal cut) of similar or slightly smaller diameter compared to your root stock plants.
Cut the tops off the root stock with matching diagonal cut.
Place top and bottom cuttings together, open tubing using the slit, wrap around, tape closed if you don't think you have a good moisture seal on the slit.

The tube won't stick and you should be able to tell when it's ready to come out, if not, wait and the plant will push it off itself.

There are three uses I know of for grafting.
1. soil disease resistance
2. ability to survive/thrive in different soils (Plum A tastes great but only grows in "not your soil", Plum B tastes like crap but grows well in your soil, stick Plum A on top of Plum B and you are set.)
3. Combine great taste (or potency) with big yield.

#1 would be useful for outdoor to avoid disease issues, could use wild as rootstock.
#2 who cares, we aren't ever going to get results we want if we settle with crap soil.
#3 I'm curious if a commercial hemp plant might make a perfect rootstock?

Sweet - thanks for the procedure - esp the tubing idea - are you supposed to use a rooting hormone or anything where the cuts join up? Also my real question was not well worded before but would a rootstock/skeleton be usable after it has made buds - like just graft on a new top and maybe a couple branches and have a plant equal to a month veg after only a week or two after grafting?

talk to
@vostok
he's done some of this.
now i've done it with peach trees. we use rootstock seeds that is specific for our region. sandy acidic loam so we use guardian or other nematode resilient rootstock. then we let it grow for about 2yrs then graft scion of the species we want...elberta, ranger, harvester peach to name a few.
i talked to vostok about it and he says it isn't worth it. better off just cloning. it takes a long time for a graft to 'take'.

That guy with no name said:

Sweet - thanks for the procedure - esp the tubing idea - are you supposed to use a rooting hormone or anything where the cuts join up? Also my real question was not well worded before but would a rootstock/skeleton be usable after it has made buds - like just graft on a new top and maybe a couple branches and have a plant equal to a month veg after only a week or two after grafting?

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You have to match similar wood to similar wood. Old stems will have larger woody cells and will not join together well with young stems. You want similar stage wood so they can pair up well. I would take cuttings, root them, then graft on to the cuttings. Young green to young green (like tomatoes) would be easiest and provide the best results I expect.

No hormones. Just keep them in a high moisture environment for a few days to a week, then transition them back to normal. (I use produce bags upside down loosely over the grow pot/bucket.)

The real question will be can you find a root stock to make this worth a damn. On perennials you have a long time for it to pay off, so things like disease resistance becomes very helpful.

Anyone know of a huge producer of horrible bud? I want some seeds of that kind to try this on now.

Graft branches on a fast growing stalk. The branches, once recovered, will grow more like the stalk. We've put 12 different branches on the same stalk. The normally low producers did better on the fast growing stalk. I want to try with hemp stalk. Doubt that will work. Hemp doesn't grow big branches. Little T Rex arm size branches.....

FYI, we've had this discussion before. The search feature and lurking a while is to your benefit.

GrowinDad said:

I have wondered about this. It is commonplace in coffee where most arabica is grafted onto a robusta stock. Robusta is more durable but arabica tastes better.

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Yep, it's a perennial thing, not practical for an annual. Speaking of coffee, if you want something really fun and tasty, buy green beans, roast them on the cheap in an old West Bend Poppery you can get off Ebay, grind them and use a brewer that dumps hot water at a temp of 194F to 205F for 80% of the time, like a Bonavita, Brazen Plus or my favorite handcrafted brand, Technivorm Moccamaster.

I tend to roast the green beans on an iron skillet and then use the French press when going for perfection. I actually used to work in the specialty coffee industry and was fortunate to get to taste some of the best coffee in the world prepared by the best baristas. There is nothing like the perfect macchiato, and I don't mean what they call one at Charbucks!

Uncle Ben said:

Yep, it's a perennial thing, not practical for an annual. Speaking of coffee, if you want something really fun and tasty, buy green beans, roast them on the cheap in an old West Bend Poppery you can get off Ebay, grind them and use a brewer that dumps hot water at a temp of 194F to 205F for 80% of the time, like a Bonavita, Brazen Plus or my favorite handcrafted brand, Technivorm Moccamaster.

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I wouldn't go that far. Go try to buy a tomato plant in parts of europe and asia and you may have a hard time finding them UN-grafted. If you see them at the nursery this spring, try one vs an un-grafted one of the same variety. You will see the difference. When you are dealing with something as cheap as tomatoes a 15-20% increase in yeild isn't worth the 300% increase in planting costs/efforts unless you are short on available planting space. In our case, a 15-20% increase in yield would be worth the effort I would think.

Uncle Ben said:

Yep, it's a perennial thing, not practical for an annual. Speaking of coffee, if you want something really fun and tasty, buy green beans, roast them on the cheap in an old West Bend Poppery you can get off Ebay, grind them and use a brewer that dumps hot water at a temp of 194F to 205F for 80% of the time, like a Bonavita, Brazen Plus or my favorite handcrafted brand, Technivorm Moccamaster.

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I had to read that 3 times before I realized you mean green coffee beans. I was imagining your garden variety green beans, I'm guessing that wouldn't be very good, lol.

imagine a 20ft tall hops climbing vine with nugs

mudballs said:

imagine a 20ft tall hops climbing vine with nugs

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As long as we are going to crazy land, how about crossing buckthorn with weed? The buckthorn has an incredible ability to produce large quantities of fruit, grow insanely fast, and like to take over all but the most dense of woods. Make them produce bud instead of berries.

Then again, with that much bud in the woods, the deer would be walking into traffic during the day.

I'm the guy you have to keep away from the DNA printer, I so would be plugging in cannabis strands into other plants and trying to replace the DNA of an algae cell and boot it in a micro-propagation agar solution.

I don't know if it would work, but it's similar to what has worked for booting custom written animal, bacteria, and virus DNA. Take an egg/embro with compatible proteins insert your DNA, minor shock, it's alive, like frankenstein, literally.

The problem is we don't understand the programming language of DNA that well yet, so 99.999999999% of the time we are going to fail miserably, and the .0000000001% of the time we succeed, we don't know WTF we are really going to get.

Just what I was looking for - not practical for annuals - was hoping it would be a worth while way to make our favorite annuals into perennials - thanks everyone for all the good grafting info tho - and please print me up some algae that grows tricomes thank you haha

That guy with no name said:

Just what I was looking for - not practical for annuals - was hoping it would be a worth while way to make our favorite annuals into perennials - thanks everyone for all the good grafting info tho - and please print me up some algae that grows tricomes thank you haha

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You are writing this off too early. It could be very useful, if we have an aggressive growing strain we can put below an average or slow strain.

If you send me a DNA printer and a $5k microscope I will get to work on that.

Read about tomato grafting, you can expect similar results, and the results are larger yields and more disease resistance. The only difference is someone has already tested and found good rootstocks for tomatoes.

nomofatum said:

You are writing this off too early. It could be very useful, if we have an aggressive growing strain we can put below an average or slow strain.

If you send me a DNA printer and a $5k microscope I will get to work on that.

Read about tomato grafting, you can expect similar results, and the results are larger yields and more disease resistance. The only difference is someone has already tested and found good rootstocks for tomatoes.

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Most commercially grown tomato varieties are indeterminate as opposed to cannabis which I would put into the determinate category.