For a long time I wondered what the reason for grafting was. A sloppy graft seemed to be so disfiguring and pointless.
However a graft is used to gain the desired qualities of a specimen tree. If the specimen tree is very straight, has many leaves or is a beautiful colour a graft can be taken to replicate the tree’s qualities. A branch is cut off the specimen tree and attached to the roots of an average tree of the same species.
I have even seen a tree where they grafted two types of japanese maples together so that it had different colour leaves either side. This shows that the grafting technique is quite versatile as we do not need exactly the same type of tree.
There is still the fact that it makes a bit of an ugly mark on the tree itself but hopefully it should grow out in the process of time. Isn’t a mark on the trunk a small price to pay for a tree with the rest of the features being beautiful?
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