The three pronged scion is ideal.

Call them 2nd year wood, crows feet or crosses. But those do work really good for scion wood. Graft take is usually a little less on 2nd year wood then fresh stuff, but it gets you a nicer plant faster.

there is probably not an answer to this...

but at what point does the trident get to be too big to graft with certitude ...

would you like the theory that is may be a function of leaf surface to root mass ...

so a tiny trident means little .. but on a species pine .. a one foot trident .. may not cope ...

i once got a graft of the pine hillside gold [another duplicate name on 2 different plants] .. and it had an 8 inch trident.. and i swear that thing just sat there for 3 years.. not dying.. but not thriving ...

perhaps its not that it cant be done.. it just that its not best????

ken

The grafter will know what to do.

For this Tom Thumb, a trident piece with a stem below is ideal scionwood. There is no such thing as too small. I can graft a scion 1/2 the width of a toothpick and 1/2" long, i.e. - it doesn't get smaller than that.

For trees, same thing, I love a trident piece with a long stem. That gives height right away.

When I see an understock and its' root mass I do imagine how big is too big of a scion, but we don't run into that cutting pencil thickness or less. I may shorten a long scion - but what I can keep, I keep.

I've been sent 3-pronged/"trident" scions with no stem below and those of course have to be made into 3 scions because there is no other way to graft them.

The Pinus resinosa Aurea scions you sent Ken, I had to find juicy cambium and I didn't find it until I was 1" below the bud/buds at the tip of your scions. So, I cut off all the stem in order to have success.

Like I said, the grafter will have to be the judge about what to do with the scions.

Dax

dax

on that res aurea .. i had a hard time finding scion that was NOT as thick as your index finger....

ken

Amen.

Dax