WHEN: Sunday August 13th. at 1:00 PM
WHERE: Please join the Redwood Empire chapter to get access to our email list. Address is sent out to members on the email list.
Come learn how or practice your summer bud grafting and participate in our summer scion exchange.
Think about what really good fruit varieties you could share.
The budwood should be cut the day of the event, labeled, and immediately put in a cooler.
Make sure you do not bring patented varieties.
Apricots, Peaches, Nectarines, Plums, Pluots, Apples, Pears and Cherries can all be propagated in the summer.
Almost all of the commercial fruit trees are budded in the summer.
Peaches/nectarines, in particular, seem to do better with summer budding.
Bring your offerings and also select what varietals you would like to have.
Our illustrious plant biologist, David Ulmer, will instruct how to chip bud for the most success.
See you all there.
WHEN: Saturday – Feb. 25, 2023
10:00 AM to 2:00 PM
WHERE: Santa Rosa Veterans Building
Across from the Sonoma County Fairgrounds
1351 Maple Avenue, Santa Rosa 95404
Free cuttings for grafting – often over 500 varieties! Grafting demonstrations by expert grafters.
Various rootstocks available for sale.
Custom trees grafted at your request (limited).
Fruit Experts available to answer questions.
Tree Sales, Bee Blocks, Crafts, Preserves, Honey!
Bring big baggies, tape to write-on or labels, and a “Sharpie” pen for labeling cuttings
Vendors may contact Phil Pieri at Phil_p_2001@ yahoo.com
We had a great time this year with the tasting and scoring. We were able to get use of the Sebastopol Grange Hall for the event. This year was a public event, and we had such a good time. Thank you to everyone involved.
David Ulmer presented a great talk about pears that was enjoyed live via Zoom by participating members. Thanks David!
Although we had planned to enjoy a nice time together at Ettamarie Parson’s place in Petaluma, a certain virus had other plans for our event. Thanks to the efforts (and courage) of David Ulmer, we gathered together on Zoom for the first time.
David hosted a live online grafting tutorial by Zoom. David made two short videos of me doing a cleft graft and a whip and tongue graft that he shared with a live voice-over. We had pelnty of time for questions and answers.
CRFG grafters and helpers turned out in force for our annual grafting “party”. This
year we congregated at Maile Pieri’s home. We grafted between 125 and 200 trees. Bob McCarville sourced good compost to add to our potting mixture — hopefully we’ll have great plant growth this year!
Have photos of this event you’d like to share? Send to webmaster at crfg-redwood dot org
We held our annual scion exchange at the Santa Rosa Veteran’s center. Hundreds of people attended this community event, collecting free scions from hundreds of varieties of fruit trees. Rootstocks were available for sale at a nominal price, and CRFG grafters were on hand to create custom- fruit trees on the spot.
More than a dozen vendors offered fruit trees, grape vines and other plants for sale as well as fresh citrus fruit and other items. Local businesses and non-profits provided information tables as well.
We continued our raffle this year with a number of fruit-related prizes raising money for our scholarship and grants fund.
Thanks to all the volunteers who helped put this event together.
CRFG held its annual grafting clinic geared for beginners and those that would like to improve their technique with hands-on guidance & support. This year’s clinic was held at the beautiful home and gardens of member Dr. Allan Bernstein.
This clinic offered a brief lecture about grafting, with demonstrations of two grafting techniques done at this time of year. Following that, we broke out with experienced grafters for some individual tutoring & practice. Participants were able to see that many grafters vary slightly in their techniques & materials.
WE RECOMMEND THE FOLLOWING PDF TUTORIAL: https://ucanr.edu/sites/camg2011/files/101893.pdf
It was written by the late Chuck Ingels and is a valuable resource. There are a few names in the fruit growing field that everyone respects – Chuck was one of those. We discussed three of the grafts that Chuck demonstrates: Whip ( also called whip and tongue), Cleft, and Chip bud. T-budding and Bark grafting require that the bark be slipping. We are not far from that time, but for now we will not do those grafts.
Various rootstocks were available for purchase. Participants were also encouraged to bring any dormant scions they wanted to graft. We shared various snacks and beverages.
Thanks to everybody who helped make this event possible, especially Allan Bernstein for hosting, David Ulmer for the wise demonstrations and Keith Borglum for photos and behind the scenes work.
