19
January/February 2018
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THE DAVEY BULLETIN
Above: Paul Snyder created roughly 40 clones of the original trees.
He did the initial grafting from the 25 scions John Siefer collected.
Those grafts had some side shoots that Snyder cut off and did some
bud grafting to create more trees.
Lost Art of Grafting
According to Paul Snyder, grafting is a lost art.
To understand the science behind grafting,
here are some key terms you need to know.
Scion: the upper part of the graft that grows
on the root system of another plant. The scion
has your desirable characteristics you want
to save.
Understock: the root system of the plant
and the part in which the scion is inserted.
For pears, the universal understock is
Bartlett pear.
When you graft, you take an understock
and a scion and fit the two pieces together
through a series of cuts.
There are different methods of grafting. In
this story, Snyder did a whip and tongue graft,
which means you cut them at an angle with
several slices so they fit together and lock
in place. The cambium layers must line up,
so that way the new vascular system can
establish between the understock and
the scion.
Above: Paul Snyder said he is interested to see how these trees mature,
to see what fruit they produce. At that point, the client can look up the
trees in a book of historic pear cultivars and pinpoint what species they are.
John Siefer and Paul Snyder are happy to have played a role in saving
these trees to give the client roughly 40 trees to carry on the legacy.
