PROPAGATION OF FRUIT PLANTS. 155 



are as far advanced. The cions should be from four to six 

 inches long. 



Grafting the Peach is occasionally practiced but it seldom 

 gives best results. Its most common use is on stocks on which 

 the buds have failed to grow and it is sometimes very successful. 



Grafting the Grape is done most safely very early in the 

 spring, even before a sign of growth appears, but it may also be 

 grafted about the time the first leaves are nicely expanded, if 

 the cions are kept dormant until that time. The work should al- 

 ways be done below the surface of the ground. Any form of 

 graft may be used, but that most commonly used is cleft-graft- 

 ing, as described. In making a cleft-graft upon a grape 

 root it is often necessary to saw the cleft in the stock with a 

 fine saw, on account of the crooked, twisted grain of the wood, 

 which does not allow it to split straight. Some growers do not 

 use any wax around the graft but simply cover it with a mound 

 of well packed earth up to the upper bud of the cion. In graft- 

 ing after the leaves are expanded some propagators prefer to 

 use side-grafting, and do not cut the vine severely until it is 

 believed the cion has grown fast to the stock, when the vine is 

 cut entirely away. Whip-grafting is also used for this purpose. 

 The cions should be about six or eight inches long. 



To change varieties in a vineyard grafting on a cane from the 

 old vine is sometimes practiced. In this case a cane from the 

 old vine long enough to reach nearly midway between the vines 

 Is grafted with a cion which should be at least two feet long. 

 When grafted the graft, including the cane and cion, should be 

 buried six inches deep, the end bud of the cion being brought 

 above the ground where the new vine is desired. The following 

 year the old vine may be largely cut away and the growth from 

 the cion will take its place. This method is not so neat as when 

 the vine is cut off and grafted below at the surface of the ground, 

 but it has the merit of being very much more certain of not neces- 

 sitating the destruction of the old vine until a new one is estab- 

 lished. 



Grafting by approach or inarching is a form of grafting in 

 which the branches of growing plants are brought together. It 

 is sometimes used to change the bearing of vines or trees, or to 



