Grafting ume to enjoy its flower for whoever living in the hot and dry climate!

bonhe

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Thanks JudyB. I believe you will love the ume more and more! :)
Bonhe
 

bonhe

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It has flowers at this time. However the flowers are smaller than the mother tree.
Yesterday.
1-25.png

Today.
1.png 2.png 3.png 4.png 5.png

Bonhe
 

Adair M

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I removed the leaves to make the tree go to sleep mode.
This year I did not have to do that.
Bonhe
Ok.

There is a technique used with Ume to induce branching: in early summer, pull off a couple of leaves on stems close to the trunk. This will prevent flower buds, and instead encourage vegetative buds to form. Where the leaves are left on, those are more likely to make flowers.

The following spring, cut the branches back leaving just the vegetative buds. Since those are close to the trunk, you'll get branching close to the trunk. Let those grow out, and repeat for next year.
 

bonhe

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Thank you Adair M. I will try this technique this year.
Bonhe
 

bonhe

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There are two 1st flowers seen this afternoon.
It has so many flowers this year!
There are more branches after one year.
On 1/26/2016
1.png

On 1/10/2017
1.png

This tree will be an experimental station for me this year. It has so many things to learn from. You can see a lot of branches coming out upward from the 2 big slanting branches.
5.png

Below pic. shows something?
6.png

How about this?
8.png

I love it!
3.png

Bonhe
 

the1only

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There are two 1st flowers seen this afternoon.
It has so many flowers this year!
There are more branches after one year.
On 1/26/2016
View attachment 128614

On 1/10/2017
View attachment 128615

This tree will be an experimental station for me this year. It has so many things to learn from. You can see a lot of branches coming out upward from the 2 big slanting branches.
View attachment 128618

Below pic. shows something?
View attachment 128619

How about this?
View attachment 128620

I love it!
View attachment 128621

Bonhe
Bonhe

Did you use Adair M technique to get more branches on this one? Love to know. Tks
 

bonhe

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My teacher gave me 12 ume rootstocks. He also gave me contorted ume branches so that I could graft it on ume rootstocks. His friend gave those stocks to him and he was not interested in grafting any more!
My teacher told me that those were !me seedlings and that their flower colors could be red, pink, white single layer and white double layers. He is not sure about the flower colors because the seeds came from Japan.
1.png

Contorted ume branch is used for scion.
2.png

Choose the scion.
7.png


During the grafting, I found something was interested. The previous owner actually grafted ume (rootstock 2 on the rootstock 1 in the past! :)
The wood of rootstock 1 has dark pink color!
6.png

The wood of ume should have ivory color.
8.png

4.png



Bonhe
 
Last edited:

bonhe

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I grafted contorted ume way down to the rootstock 1.
3.png

p/s: we must graft way down to the soil line to avoid the esthetic problem later on due to the
difference of the rootstock and scion bark later on.
Like this one, it is too high!
5.png

It takes a little more effort during the procedure and afterward care! For some reason, I hate to see the beautiful bonsai with obvious grafted mark on trunk or branches! It means the man-made tree right there! It will deeply devalue the tree if the viewer knows it was! :p

I totally grafted 6 ume. The rest will be trained to bonsai!
9.png

Bonhe
 

bonhe

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It has 10 flowers this morning. I could enjoy its fragrance now! :)
IMG_5584.jpg

I love taking the flower pictures, so please bare with me!
IMG_5585.jpg IMG_5586.jpg IMG_5587.jpg IMG_5588.jpg IMG_5589.jpg IMG_5593.jpg

How tine it is!
IMG_5590.jpg

Tiny but beautiful!
IMG_5592.jpg

Bonhe
 
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