The Accidental Smallholder Forum

Growing => Fruit => Topic started by: Womble on February 15, 2015, 12:17:21 pm

Title: Grafting new apple tree onto existing root
Post by: Womble on February 15, 2015, 12:17:21 pm

We have four established apple trees here that suffer terribly from canker. As a result, they are a really poor shape. They also don't produce much, since once I prune off the diseased branches every year, there's not much of last year's growth left to produce fruit in the coming year!

However,  before I cut them down and plant new trees, I want to find out if I could cut off the old tree and graft a new, more canker resistant variety onto the existing root?

Any thoughts as to whether this is worth doing, and if so, how and when to go about it?  :thumbsup:

Title: Re: Grafting new apple tree onto existing root
Post by: clydesdaleclopper on February 15, 2015, 12:20:22 pm

Certainly possible and now is the time of year to do it. One thing to check though is if the rootstock is one that is canker prone.