Grafting Apple Trees - Part Two

The second post/video of grafting apple trees using the AGPTek Grafting Tool. It was our first time using it and it worked great. We bought our rootstock through Lawyers Nursery and the Scions were sent from a homesteading friend (Thanks Dona!) from Maine. If you feel the need to comment about how dangerous my son was opening the box with the scissors, at least give me an upvote and a follow! ;-)

Again, difficulties with Dtube uploads. I want to love them so much... but unfortunately we'll have to post on YouTube.

**LAYOUT YOUR WORK AREA**

It's always good to layout your tools and work area! See the first post for more information on the tools used.

This awkward tool is what we used to make the graft.

The Three Blades from top to bottom: V-Sharp, U-Sharp, Omega Blade.

Cutting the rootstock.

Cutting the Scion - Make sure you're cutting in the same directions!

The scion cut.

Getting ready to put them together.

Up next time, we'll put some wax tape on them, mark them and put them in the peat moss bucket to store in the basement until we get closer to spring!

Overall review of the tool:

This tool worked great. Yes, you CAN graft with just a knife and you can do it effectively, but the uniform cut and fit of the graft with this tool is just a thing of beauty. You really can't beat it for $15.00.

A Word of Caution:

I know I made light of my son and the scissors, but seriously, the most dangerous thing in dealing with this grafting tool is the danger of a serious laceration, even to the point of possibly losing a finger or doing serious damage. If you watch the video you'll see that when I'm focused on aligning the rootstock for a cut, I'm NOT focused on the open cutting jaws... and the "snap" of pressure to use the graft blade could have done my fingers some serious harm. In the future I will hold the rootstock and scion in a clamp of some sort or have a helper old it while I keep my left hand clear. Thankfully I didn't cut myself... but beware of it ok?

If you found this helpful, please consider an upvote, a follow, a resteem and a comment!

You may find some of these other recent articles helpful too:

Grafting Apple Trees - Part 1:
Beekeeping In Bear Country - Simple Things To Help Avoid Disaster.
Beehive Bear Strapping Video How-
How To Make Your Own Butter and Store it Without Refrigeration:
Bob's Make-Do Greenhouse. Plastic Water Pipe, 6 Mil Barrier and Duct-Tape.
7 Pieces of Advice to New Homestead Ham Operators (or Wannabe's)

And remember to GROW WHERE YOU ARE!