I always make it a gunpoint to try out something new in my garden every class . Although it ordinarily mean I ’m going to grow some new variety of radish or a veggie I have n’t get before ( like peanuts orsalsify ) , this year the “ unexampled ” item in my garden is going to begrafted tomatoesand ingraft eggplants .
Grafted veggies start pop up up in seed catalogs a few years back , though apparently large - scale grocery granger had already been growing them for years . I ’ve been meaning to try them in my own garden since I first spotted them in the Territorial Seed catalogue , but I ’m just now getting around to it .
I planted two grafted tomatoes and one eggplant . They are created by attaching the shoot organisation of the hope eggplant or love apple ( a Brandywine Lycopersicon esculentum for example ) to the root system of a crack - solid , disease - resistant variety . The plants are engraft together as petite seedlings , and they go on to develop as one works . It ’s the same process they use to produce many yield trees , roses and “ poodle ” topiary bushes . The resulting industrial plant is articulate to show increased vigor , earlier output , skillful disease resistance and increase yields . I ’m acquire my transplant vegetable side - by - side with plenty of non - grafted ones so that I can make an wanton comparing as the time of year come along .
The only thing you need to do otherwise with grafted veggie is to ensure that transplant marriage ( easily visible as a raised ridgeline on the stem ) remains well above the soil level at planting time . If it ’s buried , the shoot system will lead off to produce its own root organization rather than relying on the one that carries the hope trait . This will negate the personal effects of the graft .
In college , I took a class ongrafting , and it ’s not a difficult process — nothing too ambitious about it . So if these grafted veggie do exceptionally swell for me this twelvemonth , perhaps I ’ll endeavor to ingraft my own next season , just for kicks . I ’ll keep you post on their progress !
Chick UpdateAnd address of progress , the chickswe beget a few week ago are now awkward teenager . They have moved out of the bathtub ( give thanks goodness ! ) and are spending their days in a fenced area adjacent to our veritable poulet run . Their nights are spent in a child pocket billiards in the garage . It ’s disturbed how fast they are growing — and how much they eat !
« More Dirt on Gardening »
