I obtained some extra very triangularly shaped budwoods from UCR this year and I know the buds from these wouldn't take very well. UCR supplied me with more than enough viable good budwoods and I am not complaining and there were lots of extras found in those triangular cross section stems that I don't want to throw away.

I also got poor quality budwoods from other friends, that I know it would be very difficult to take budwoods from.

So, I bark grafted these unsuitable budwoods, and today I've got 100% budsprouts on each one of them!

Bark grafting is truly a good alternative if you get very lousy budwoods.

I also did chip-budding for the heck of it. With chip budding, I sealed off the entire bud, place rubber band, then sealed off with parafilm. One of them has sprouted, as well as most of my T-buds which sprouted faster, and none of them died.

I have one chip bud that died, it was from a budwood collected one year ago and did not have enough for T-bud. The T-bud would have also died.

Will try to post pics later.

Also, all of my bark grafted persimmons have taken and pushing out vigorously!!! Even the new graft whose branches and buds were stripped off by the strong winds have sprouted new branches.

And some of them are even blooming. I will let them bear fruit, they are so vigorous.

My persimmons are growing vigorously as well Joe-- thanks for all your help. I will try to get some pictures when I get back in a week or so. I have 2 buds pushing out on each graft-- they are all 4 to 6 inches already.