Today on the farm I learned about grafting! I know, you're probably thinking "what the egg is that?" I didn't know either haha. I kind of felt like an oddball since I volunteer with all horticulture majors and I'm an engineering major but I picked it up quickly, and it's actually pretty cool.
We did 2 types of grafting.
From Wikipedia, grafting is: a horticultural technique whereby tissues from one plant are inserted into those of another so that the two sets of vascular tissues may join together.
The grafting on the far left was done by slicing just a small side of a Better Boy and a Sweet 100 (tomatoes) and clamping them together.
The grafting on the right hand side was done by keeping the base of a Better Boy and replacing the top with a Sweet 100. We did this by taking a Better Boy and a Sweet 100 plant, finding similar diameters in the stem of each plant, slicing the section with the similar diameters of both plants and switching the sliced sections with the other plant.
Why graft plants? Well in some cases (which was found to have mixed results) the grafted plants yielded better produce and results. You would essential take a plant that has low resistance to pests and help it by attaching a plant with a high resistance to pests, to aid in the plants well being.
It was a lot of fun, and I though it was interesting!
The bottom pictures are from today's harvest!
We did 2 types of grafting.
From Wikipedia, grafting is: a horticultural technique whereby tissues from one plant are inserted into those of another so that the two sets of vascular tissues may join together.
The grafting on the far left was done by slicing just a small side of a Better Boy and a Sweet 100 (tomatoes) and clamping them together.
The grafting on the right hand side was done by keeping the base of a Better Boy and replacing the top with a Sweet 100. We did this by taking a Better Boy and a Sweet 100 plant, finding similar diameters in the stem of each plant, slicing the section with the similar diameters of both plants and switching the sliced sections with the other plant.
Why graft plants? Well in some cases (which was found to have mixed results) the grafted plants yielded better produce and results. You would essential take a plant that has low resistance to pests and help it by attaching a plant with a high resistance to pests, to aid in the plants well being.
It was a lot of fun, and I though it was interesting!
The bottom pictures are from today's harvest!