chances are you've heard the story of frankenstein where some guy put together a body using parts from diff... well, you know the story. what you probably didn't know if that you've been eating franken veggies on more than one occasion now. while plant's aren't brought back from the dead, certain method of production call for plants to be cut apart and recombined. such a process is referred to as grafting.
you say: 'thats soooo cool!... wait, why?!'
well, thats because its not the easiest thing to create the ultimate plant(and also just cos we can!). you see, plants with great growth traits are limited by their root systems. because of this, some cultivars known as root-stock cultivars have been specially bred for robust root development and nutrient uptake as well as disease tolerance. put the shoot from the former on the root of the latter and we've got ourselves a plant that will outperform other cultivars in terms of yield and resistance to disease.
its an expensive and time consuming process though cos you have to pay for labour and extra seed so such a process is typically done only for fruit trees as well as high value crops like tomatoes and the Japanese yubari melon that can go for over $100 a fruit (!!).
stay tuned for some photos of a tomato graft (we're waiting for it to heal right now)
you say: 'thats soooo cool!... wait, why?!'
well, thats because its not the easiest thing to create the ultimate plant(and also just cos we can!). you see, plants with great growth traits are limited by their root systems. because of this, some cultivars known as root-stock cultivars have been specially bred for robust root development and nutrient uptake as well as disease tolerance. put the shoot from the former on the root of the latter and we've got ourselves a plant that will outperform other cultivars in terms of yield and resistance to disease.
its an expensive and time consuming process though cos you have to pay for labour and extra seed so such a process is typically done only for fruit trees as well as high value crops like tomatoes and the Japanese yubari melon that can go for over $100 a fruit (!!).
stay tuned for some photos of a tomato graft (we're waiting for it to heal right now)
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