Apple Tree Grafting

This weekend I was lucky enough to take an apple tree grafting class taught by Patrick Haulman of the Arizona Rare Fruit Growers. At the end of the class I had my own brand new apple tree that I made by cleft grafting a piece of Sundowner scion wood onto a M-111 rootstock. Sundowner is a new apple in Phoenix and is considered to be the only red apple that will grow in Phoenix. Everything is still in the we'll see how it does mode. I also learned from Patrick that you can grow any apple in Phoenix and get varying results and production. That's right you can plant a Granny Smith and you just might get some apples off of it. The ratings of what and where apples will grow are actually set by commercial growers but the home orchardist can still get results just not on a commercial scale. I'm going to have to rewrite my intro.

M-111 rootstock

M-111 rootstock cut in half the red handled knife is a grafting knife and it only has an edge on one side.

The begining of the graft, slice down the middle of the rootstock twice the thickness of the knife.

This is the Sundowner scion wood and I've carved it into a V shape.

Next insert your V cut scion into the rootstock. Here is the important part all your cuts must be touching each other, any gaps and the graft will fail. I had to redo my V cut several times to get the perfect fit.

Now cover the entire graft in parafilm paper, this holds the graft together but allows it to breath.

Finally cover everything in green strechy tape, the tape comes off in a month. We'll see if I did a good graft, the tree should start budding out in a couple of months. When it does I'll transplant to a 2 gallon pot for the summer and once fall arrives I'll plant it out in the yard. If it grows????

WORK WORK WORK

This is by far my favorite time of year, everything is blooming, the weather is perfect, and I'm starting some new garden beds. It all equates to a bunch of work, but it's fun and rewarding. In this post I'll share where I get some of my cheap/free organic materials. I'll show you the elusive Giant Yellow Wood Boring Bee, we'll eat some weeds, and finally my asparagus is coming up.

This is Rovey Dairy it's down the street from my house, for $10 you can hand load a whole trailer full of composted steer manure. That's right that pile in the picture is all bull#$&!. It's a great deal my trailer is 4' wide by 8' long by 3' tall, filled to the top I get 14 wheel barrows of compost. I know there's no way it can be all organic with all the chemicals that are injected into dairy cows, but still it's a great deal.

This is not a commercial for Starbucks, to be honest with you I've never even set foot in a Starbucks. Last week I was talking with my parents about black compost gold (coffee grounds) I was saying that I wish I new someone that worked at a coffee shop, all those coffee grounds would be great for my compost and soil building projects. Low and behold my step dad rides his bike over to Starbucks the next day and asks the manager "what do you do with your coffee grounds?" The manager points over to a large trash can and says "we save all of our coffee grounds for the local gardeners, go ahead and help yourself to as much as you want" WTF corporate America reaching out and helping local gardeners. I've gotta get out more. So thank you Starbucks, thank you Ken, and go have all the vanilla lattes you can drink.

20 pounds of Starbucks coffee grounds.

I mulched around all my blueberry plants with the coffee grounds. Blueberries love acidic soil so it only makes sense to mulch them with acidic coffee grounds. So the plants have a free, organic, acidic fertilizer. 

I put the rest in my 2 compost bins

Ever see this weed before it's called Mallow. It is a close relative to Holly Hock. This time of year it growing everywhere. So grab some out of your yard and wash it off

Fry it up with some bacon fat, garlic chives, and onion.

When it's finished top with grated parmasean,salt and pepper to taste, and boom fried weeds believe it or not it's delicious.

It's about time my first Asparagus spear has sprouted I planted this bed a year and a half ago and this will be the first time I'll be able to harvest it. I get off on eating weeds just think how excited I am to get fresh Asparagus  spears.

Finally I discovered this guy he's a golden carpenter bee. All the carpenter bees I've seen are black this is the first golden one. You can find more info on them here. Do you see his hole in the log table. As a side note that's my wifes table when we sit outside. If she only new what lived inside of it. The golden bees are supposed to be the males of the species. These are very cool solitary bees, and they are great pollinators, they're always welcome around here.

Here he is going into his hole I'll try and get a better pic of him but taking good bee pics is tough.

PICTURE POST

I'm a little tired this morning so I'm just going to show you a bunch of pics of what's going down on the farm.

This guy showed up on the wall above my front yard garden a month ago.


Yesterday I found this.

And here she is almost ready to fly off if you look close you see her drivers side wing isn't unfolded all the way.

Almond tree in full bloom with a chicken grazing.

Baby almond, almonds are just like peaches, when they are growing they look like a peach but you don't eat the flesh, instead the flesh dries out and you eat the pit (an almond).

The one almond my 2 trees produced last year.

Sunshine Blueberry blooms, this blue berry probably has 500 flowers on it, my other 3 Misty Blueberries aren't blooming?????

Remember all my tomato and pepper starts?

Here they are none the peppers did well I'll have to work on that next year but I've got 40 tomato plants.

Burgundy Plum that I cut down to 24 inches is bustin out the Santa Rosa is still dormant.

Anna Apple in bloom.

Potatoes are coming up.

Remember compost pile omega

Here it is compost pile not so omega. That giant pile of organic matter has turned into this little pile of compost. The rule is 1000 pounds of organic matter will turn into 200 pounds of compost.

Southern Belle Necatarine in bloom.

Bonanza Peach in bloom.

FINALLY BE CAREFUL THE CHICKENS ARE WATCHING.