The Best Garden Grafting Tool

For those who really love their plants, gardening can be a creative act. Sure, there are a lot of activities that certainly don’t feel that way. Simple, day-to-day caretaking chores like watering and even planting can seem like you’re just clearing a path for your greenery to do its own thing.

But then there’s the act of grafting, which really lets you take an active role in how your plants evolve. It can feel a bit like you’re Dr. Frankenstein, combining two plants into a whole that’s better than the sum of its parts, but there are few better ways to get your fruit trees and flowers to thrive in places where they’d otherwise wilt.

In a nutshell, the act of grafting joins two plants together into one. This is done by splicing the upper part of a tree or plant (known as the “scion”) onto the lower portion of another (the “rootstock,” or “stock”). This results in a plant that will (in most cases) grow the fruits and flowers of the scion portion while gaining the benefits of the rootstock, such as resistance to local pests or adaptability to certain weather conditions. This cannot be done with just any pair of plants, but combining the right two types of trees can result in a thriving, beautiful hybrid.

There are many different ways to graft, including a practice called budding. In budding, the entire top part of a plant is not removed to produce a rootstock. Instead, a small cut is made in the side of the plant, typically less than 4 inches above the root system. A small bud from the scion plant (rather than the entire top portion) is then inserted into the cut and secured there. This can be done anytime during the growing season, whereas full grafting can only be done while the plant is dormant.

The process of grafting and budding is essentially plant surgery, and as such there are a lot of different cuts that need to be made in order to get your scion and rootstock to join just right. That’s where a good grafting tool comes in. A grafting tool might resemble a particularly complicated pair of pruning shears, and like pruning shears, the blades are made for cutting thick branches. But where shears only need to make a straight cut, a grafting tool can clip a branch so that the ends form convex or concave shapes. When properly applied, those cuts will allow a scion to fit onto the rootstock like a puzzle piece and take hold easier.

At a minimum, your grafting tool should be able to make a simple V-cut. Most grafting tools are more versatile than that, though. A superior one should come with replaceable blades that can cut in omega or U-formations better suited to certain grafting techniques. If you’re going to be doing any budding, look for a tool that can make a cut along the side of a branch. Budding takes a bit more skill than simple grafting, but a solid grafting tool can make it much easier.

Ideally, your tool should come with grafting tape and rubber bands to hold your new hybrid plant together, but these accessories won’t need to be specific to your gardening work as long as they’re waterproof. Just make sure that your grafting tool is weather-resistant, and make sure you clean it between cuttings. It’ll save you days worth of work over the years if you care for it properly.

• When it comes to grafting, timing is everything. Select a twig from the plant you have in mind for a scion during the dormant season. Make sure you get one that has new buds on it and refrigerate the twig in a plastic bag until the spring.
• Once the process of grafting a plant is done, that’s where your work really begins. After-care is essential while the scion binds to the rootstock, and that means making sure your seal stays airtight. Reapply wax around your tape as needed in three to five days after grafting. You’ll also want to aggressively prune away any new growth below the graft, which will ensure all the rootstock’s resources flow to the new scion.