Grafting

[Aggie]

I've been speculating about grafting lately...  herbs in particular.

What I'm wondering about specifically is whether you can cross-graft various mint-family herbs onto different species.  What I've got in mind is ways to establish large amounts of basil quickly from existing plants (or waste stems skived from work). I've lots of species to choose from, including catnip, peppermint, sage and ground-ivy (which is a bit weedy).

I also stumbled across some manroot (Marah spp.) today, and wonder if the massive tubers would be a good rootstock for cucumber...

I'm planning to try grafting potato onto tomato rootstock, to get potato seed production.

[pieces o nine]

Good topic Aggie!  I've heard of grafting smaller plants such as herbs, but have never tried it. I'll be watching this thread for tips.   

[Opsa]

The cross-grafting sounds like a neat experiment.

[Aggie]

I know with some plants the results can be disappointing in terms of flavour and edibility.  I suppose it depends where various compounds are produced in the plant, and how they are transported.

[Opsa]

You'll still love the monsters though, won't you? 

[Roland Deschain]

Ok, so this is a bizarre idea. I've known tree grafting, specifically with fruit trees, but never with herbs. It could produce some really interesting plants, and if you experiment with grafting many different species together, you could eventually come up with a chimaera producing something rather special (amongst all the weird ones and failures).

[Bluenose]

Hmm, very interesting.  I would have thought that you can only successfully graft woody plants, but if you can get herbs to work it would be a great thing for people with little room to plant all separate plants.  Let us know how the experiment goes!

[Opsa]

Some herbs get woodier as they mature. Maybe Aggie will have more luck with those.

[Aggie]

Based on the info I've seen on potatoes and tomatoes, it shouldn't be a problem to graft herbaceous, soft-stemmed plants.  I'd think it's rather easier to do, in fact - these things often root easily from cuttings compared to woody plants.

What I'm most concerned/interested about is inter-genera grafting within Lamiaceae.  Hmm... speaking of woody varieties, grafting rosemary to sage would also be a valuable one to try. I can get rosemary stems for free, and while it's effectively an annual in this climate, sage is perennial (and I have a large established rootstock).

[Roland Deschain]

Let us know how it goes. It could be something to try, and i'd love to know what works and what doesn't. I suppose the most closely related species would be more likely to work. I can imagine a sage with the different varieties grafted on, such as the plain leaf colour version with the variegated ones. It would look spectacular.