NEW METHODS OF GRAFTING AND BUDDING. 13 



rejected, as it is not ripe enough. It is hard to explain this mode of 

 operating, but it is really easy in practice. 



Making the Slit on the Stock. On one- or two-year-old canes, the 

 slit should be made on the rounded part where the bark is thicker and 

 will protect better against desication. However, if the scion-bud has 

 a little sap-wood attached, it is better to place it on the flat side. On 

 old wood the bark is so thin that it is almost impossible to lift it off. 



Ligatures. The best are made out of lead or tinfoil tied with raffia 

 or cotton. The foil is cut into pieces three-quarters to one inch wide 

 and two to three inches long. 



Arrangement of Mother Stock. All shoots of American stock may 

 be readily budded; that is to say a person can place on a vigorous 

 cane from ten to twenty buds and obtain the next season from one 

 vigorous mother vine 100 to 150 grafted cuttings. Long experience 

 has shown that to obtain these results it is necessary to arrange the 

 stocks in the following manner: 



Stakes about six or eight feet high are erected ten to fifteen feet 

 apart. As soon as the shoots of the mother stock are about twenty 

 inches in length, eight to twelve are preserved and the balance dis- 

 budded. The shoots are tied up in V-shape as soon as hard enough, 

 all auxiliary buds and tendrils being removed; this is repeated three 

 times in the season. The even numbered shoots are tied up on one 

 side and those of odd numbers on the other; this facilitates the bud- 

 ding and collecting of the knitted cuttings; twice the amount of 

 wood fit to be budded is obtained in this way. On an experimental 

 plot one hundred 4-year-old Riparia were trellised and as many left 

 without trellising. The first gave an average of 175 feet, the latter 

 75 feet of wood suitable for budding. 



Gathering and Keeping the Budded Cuttings. We should wait until 

 the leaves have fallen off before gathering the cuttings; they should 

 be cut off on the spot; the whole cane should not be cut off and 

 then the cuttings be removed later, as they are apt to be bruised if 

 treated thus. As the cuttings are gathered, the eyes of the stock are 

 removed, excising them with a grafting knife as closely as possible; 

 those where the buds have missed may be kept to be bench-grafted the 

 next spring. The good ones are placed in cases, in layers separated 

 by fresh moss or moist straw. A lid is placed on the box and the 

 cases are placed in a closed, dry, frost-proof room, and kept until 

 planted. Then the boxes are taken out to the nursery, the cuttings 

 taken out one by one, and their upper end freshened with a grafting 

 knife (not shears), three-fourths to one inch being removed at each 

 end. The cut end is then coated with tar. 



