SPECIAL FUNCTIONS AND FORMS OF STEMS 91 
87. Budding and grafting. The process of budding consists 
of detaching an uninjured bud from the stem of one plant and 
inserting it under the bark of the stem of another plant 
(fig. 74). Peaches and cherries are familiar examples of trees 
commonly propagated by budding. The operation should be 
performed at a season when the cambium layer is active, so 
that the transplanted bud will at once unite with the wood of 
Fie. 74. Propagation by budding 
A, a bud cut from a tree of the desired variety, with a piece of the underlying 
bark ; B, the bud inserted in a T-shaped slit in the bark of the stock; C, the same 
with the bark bound in place by strips of raffia (a fibrous material obtained from 
the leaves of the raftia palm). Modified after Percival 
the stem into which it is set. In the case of peaches, the young 
seedling trees grown from seeds planted the same spring are 
budded in June or September. Those budded late do not grow 
much until the next season, but then make rapid progress. As 
the top of the seedling is cut off not far above the bud, all 
further growth of the shoot partakes of the quality of the bud, 
and the fruit borne by the tree, when it is large enough to 
bear, will be of the kind that is characteristic of the tree from 
which the bud was taken. 
Grafting is removing a piece of stem, with its buds, from 
one plant and inserting it into a portion of stem of another 
