Tamarind monograph.pdf - Crops for the Future

months old and of uniform size should be selected. The scions should be
defoliated before grafting. Veneer grafts are made eight cm high on the root
stock and immediately after inserting the scion the root stock is removed
above the graft union. This method is reported to give about 50% success
(Amin, 1978; Purushotham and Narasimharao, 1990).
For softwood grafting, the rootstock seedlings should be defoliated and their
tops cut off at 15 cm high immediately before grafting. A vertical downward
cut is made in the centre of the cut stem to about four cm depth and the scion
sticks are cut into wedge shapes, inserted into the stock and wrapped using
two cm wide 200 gauge polyethylene ribbon. Soft wood grafting has been
shown to be the best grafting method in terms of successful unions and
survival rates (Navaneetha et al., 1990) (see Plates 6,7).
Three grafting methods for propagating tamarind in the Coast of Colima,
Mexico, splice side graft, wedge graft and bud graft, were evaluated
(Gonzalez-Gonzalez et al., 2001). Rootstocks were from 8-month-old
healthy plants 1 m tall and 1 cm in diameter, obtained from Criollo
seedlings, and the scions were obtained from a healthy 15-year-old ‘Criollo
Veracruz’ donor tree. This donor was selected for its excellent agronomic
traits and fruit yield. Naturally defoliated, vigorous and terminal scions
were disinfected with fungicide and used the same day that they were
excised. Splice side grafting resulted in 79% success after 20 days.
In the sub-humid parts of India, experiments revealed that the time of
grafting significantly influenced per cent sprouting, days to sprout, per cent
graft success, and linear and radial growth (Awasthi and Shukla, 2003).
Softwood grafting in April resulted in highest graft success (83%),
maximum linear growth (56 cm), and maximum saleable plants (74%) in the
following March. Similar results were obtained by Bharad et al. (1999) who
found that March and April were the better months for grafting under the
conditions in Akola, India. Under the conditions pertaining in Karnataka,
India, the time required for grafts to take was longer during the winter
months (October to December) than during other months (Reddy et al., 200).
As the temperature increased, the time taken for graft union and sprouting
decreased, with the least number of days (14) being observed in March. The
graft take was better in pre-cured than uncured scions. The highest success
percentage (100%) in cured scions was recorded during March, closely
followed by February (94%).
Successful grafting techniques have been reported in Peru (Ramirez et al.,
1986) where scions grafted on to wild, criollo rootstocks of 0.66-0.75 cm
diameter were the best. The success achieved for splice grafting and whip
and tongue grafting was 65.3% and 61.3%, respectively. Shield budding was
much less successful.
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