If I am lucky, I will be getting some white sapote scion wood. I currently have a Vernon in the ground and various seedlings in pots. I would like to eventually add multiple flavors to my Vernon and even add or bank the rest on some seedlings. The Vernon has branches about finger diameter and the seedlings are about pencil dia.+. Let me add, I've never grafted before, though the concept seems very doable for me.

Any suggestions which type of graft would work best, cleft, bark, staples and duct tape?

thanks,
-Ethan

I don't know anything about white sapote, but Joe's bark graft technique will probably work on anything, depending on the right size of the stocks. For the bark graft, your scion needs to be about 1/4 the size of the rootstock (or less). I have done it with pecan, persimmon, citrus and avocado and all have worked (at least I think the avocado took). The smallest wood I worked with was pencil size rootstock with toothpick size scions on citrus. The difficulty there is getting the longest smooth diagonal cut you can get on the scion (but still stiff enough to insert). However you do not have to make that cut as one continuous cut as I used to try to do--you can sort of whittle it to shape.

thanks Skeet,
it seems to be a very good graft to use, I'll have to see what size the scions are.

-Ethan.

Many sapote seedlings has barks that don't slip and are very leaky of latex. The best methods to graft these would be wedge grafting like you would avocadoes, and also chip budding. It would be difficult for bark graft but it is possible because it will be a bit hard to lift the barks. There is a way to trick the bark into slipping, but I'm not sure if I remember it right. that is, to cut the leaves and leaving the petioles until they easily fall off, then do the grafting.

White sapote (which is not related to anything else named "sapote," but is a citrus relative), does not produce latex. I've grafted lots of them, using mostly chip buds or veneer grafts. Both work very well, and give a nearly 100% success rate.

Malcolm

thank you gentlemen for your response.
I will look into chip buds and veneer grafts futher.

thanks again,
-Ethan