Dr. Cindy and Dr. Kay* Operate!

Cindy started tomato plants and some tomato root stock a couple of weeks ago.  They've been quietly growing away under grow lights in the garage and getting steadily bigger.  Last year Cindy grafted one tomato, a Box Car Willie, onto root stock and it did very well, out performing the non-grafted Box Car Willie throughout the growing season.  In fact, the non-grafted plant cashed it its chips long before the grafted one.  See:  Box Car Willie Update, Last Tomato Standing, and One More Thing for last year's experiment.

So, of course this year she had greater ambitions, deciding to graft more Box Car Willie plants, but also some Stupice plants onto one of three different root stocks:  Supernatural Hybrid (Territorial Seed Company), RST - 04 -106 (Tomato Growers Supply Company) and Estamino F1 Rootstock (Natural Gardening Company).  She started both the tomato and root stock plants from seed.

Preparing to Operate

It's a delicate operation because you have to find a tomato plant and a root stock plant with approximately the same size stems so that they will match up and allow nutrients to flow up from the root stock to the leaves and tomatoes.

Leaving the plants in their plastic grow cells, Cindy sliced off the top of one root stock plant and discarded it, then made a vertical cut about a quarter of an inch deep in the very thin stem.  Next, she carefully sliced off the top of one of the tomato plants and shaved slices off the lower end of the stem and then inserted the tomato stem into the vertical cut in the root stock stem.

Slicing the Plants

The most delicate part of the operation involves using a plastic clip to connect the tomato stem with the root stock stem; the dang clips just did not want to cooperate.

Clip It

Once the plants were all snipped and clipped, they and their plastic containers went into a larger plastic container and were placed on a capillary mat.  Then they were covered with another container to provide sufficient height and some plastic wrap to retain humidity.  Finally, they were placed in Cindy's closet so that the entire system would stay dark and moist for several days, allowing the stems to heal.  At least, that was the plan.

Grafted Tomatoes

We just checked the plants three days after grafting, and most of them appear to have survived.  One of the Box Car Willies on a Supernatural root stock had wilted and clearly didn't make it, but the rest seem to be thriving.  If they continue to survive, we'll have three grafted Box Car Willies and two Stupices on the different root stocks, as well as several other ungrafted plants.

They're Alive So Far

*  OK, it's a PhD in the Philosophy of Religion and a Juris Doctor degree, but hey, we're operating on plants.