Grafting trident maple on to Japanese Maple

[Beaumatsu2]

Hi everyone,

I recently inherited a old 1970's Japanese maple off a family friend. They had let the Japanese maple get long and lanky. It also has some dead branches. So basically it's got a great trunk but only two living branches. I live on the Gold Coast and Japanese maples grow here they don't thrive in my opinion. I was wondering would it be possible to graft trident maple onto the Japanese maple and have that beautiful trunk with foliage that can withstand the Queensland weather conditions. Has anyone had any experience in attempting this idea before?

Thank you


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[bodhidharma]

It looks like you will have to be the trail blazer on this one.

[Truth]

They are not the same species, they are not compatible. Acer Palmatum can graft to closely related species, such as Shirasawanum, and Acer Japonicum, but Buergerianum is just too distantly related for graft compatibility. Just a fact of biology.

Ray Nesci has tried many times to get Palmatum leaf to graft to a Buergerianum hardy rootstock, but as he can attest to, he has only met failure.

[Craigg]

I agree with Truth on this one. I recall reading something by J D Vertrees many years ago relating to graft incompatibilities between maples. In addition to this, even if it were possible I am not sure it would eliminate the problems with climate that you are trying to avoid.

I will see if I can find the book and give you some more details

[shibui]

I take your word that these 2 plants are not compatible Truth but I'm not sure what your first statement has to do with the issue?

They are not the same species, they are not compatible.

We graft many different species together - Most plum species are compatible. You have given us a number of acer species that you say are compatible as well.

While we do often use species and genus to indicate possible grafting matches there are plenty of cases where we can even graft less closely related plants - it is possible to graft some Pyrus (pears) onto Cydonia (quince). Poncirus trifoliata is regularly used as a rootstock for Citrus varieties and I regularly use Myoporum as a rootstock for Eremophila species. These are just a few examples of compatible inter generic grafts.

There are even cases where a graft one way will not take but the other direction is quite compatible - Japanese plum is often grafted onto European plum rootstock but for some reason European plum won't graft onto the Japanese varieties. This means that even though Ray has not been able to graft A. palmatum onto trident there is still a slim chance that trident onto palmatum ( which is what Beaumatsu wants to do) could be successful.

Personally, I don't think it is even worth trying to graft trident onto Japanese maple. Quite apart from compatability issues, we normally graft using a strong rootstock to give the grafted plant vigour. I can't see any point in grafting a strong species onto a weaker rootstock and, as Craigg has pointed out the Japanese maple roots and trunk will probably still be susceptible to the warm climate, even if you can get trident leaves and branches onto it.

[Craigg]

Neil is right in terms of inter-species grafting, and it made me look a little further. The European and Japanese plum (P domestica and P salicina respectively) both belong the the Section Prunus which was interesting (I will need to research the others further)

However there seem to be some problems with grafting between the Sections and Series of some Species.

The Trident maple ( Acer Buergerianum) belongs to the section Pentaphylla and the series Trifida. The series Trifida contains about 10 species, including A.paxii, A.discolor, and A. oblongum, and including the subspecies Formosanum (know as the Taiwan Maple).

The Japanese Maple (Acer palmatum) belongs to the section Palmata, and series Palmata. The series Palmata contains about 11 species including Acer japonicum, Acer circinatum (the vine maple) and Acer shirasawanum.

Grafting within the series will work however grafting between the series (ie trifida to palmata) may initially be successful but will fail over time. Hence you can successfully graft A. japonicum or A. circinatum onto Acer palmatum, or A. paxii onto A. buergerianum, but not A. Buergerianum onto A. palmatum or vice versa.

As Neil has said, I am not sure that it is worth trying as it will be susceptible to the climate (not so much the heat, but a lack of cold if that makes sense). The only real solution is to grow it in a climate that suits the tree.

[Craigg]

sorry duplicated the post

[Beaumatsu2]

Thank you everyone for their input. It has giving me a lot to think about and I definitely learnt a lot just then reading over this.


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[toshtony]

How about the other way around trident for strong roots and Japanese maple for the top. I've been looking into some rare maples and noticed they are all pretty much all grafted and pretty high up on trunk. Seeds are unviable and likely not to be the same anyway, cuttings I haven't been able to strike. I was thinking at getting rare maples eg a full moon maple and try grafting it into trident, if not possible a common Japanese maples as low as possible for bonsai purposes. Has anyone tried this

[Andrew Legg]

How about the other way around trident for strong roots and Japanese maple for the top. I've been looking into some rare maples and noticed they are all pretty much all grafted and pretty high up on trunk. Seeds are unviable and likely not to be the same anyway, cuttings I haven't been able to strike. I was thinking at getting rare maples eg a full moon maple and try grafting it into trident, if not possible a common Japanese maples as low as possible for bonsai purposes. Has anyone tried this

Best is to grow Japanese maple (Acer palmatum) rootstock and then thread graft these as roots onto the other fancy stuff.