{"id":15330,"date":"2022-07-29T11:47:07","date_gmt":"2022-07-29T18:47:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gregalder.com\/yardposts\/?p=15330"},"modified":"2022-08-02T17:20:58","modified_gmt":"2022-08-03T00:20:58","slug":"grafting-onto-citrus-rootstock-suckers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregalder.com\/yardposts\/grafting-onto-citrus-rootstock-suckers\/","title":{"rendered":"Grafting onto citrus rootstock suckers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Citrus trees often shoot up branches from down low on the trunk. If low enough — below the graft union — then these “suckers” are from the rootstock. In a sense, these are dangerous, and it’s important to remove them immediately. See details on why and how in my post, “Beware of rootstock suckers on citrus trees.”<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet roostock suckers can be useful. Instead of removing them, you can graft onto them and add another citrus variety to your tree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, if you had a Washington navel orange<\/a> tree that sent up a rootstock sucker, you could graft Cara Cara navel orange<\/a> onto it. Then you would have both orange oranges and pink oranges on the same tree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Or if you had a Gold Nugget<\/a> mandarin tree that sent up a rootstock sucker, you could graft an earlier-season mandarin variety such as Satsuma or Kishu<\/a> onto it in order to have mandarins from that tree for more months of the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A real example<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my yard, I had an old mandarin tree that sent up numerous rootstock suckers. (See photo above.) I let them grow and take over; the original mandarin branches eventually died. Then I grafted multiple citrus varieties onto the rootstock suckers (grapefruit, mandarins, etc.). Now I have started what some call a “cocktail” citrus tree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s a photo of one of the grafts:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Heres a video showing the tree:<\/p>\n\n\n\n