North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[anton ptak <antonptak@gmail.com>]

Has anyone any success grafting quince onto OHF or other pear rootstocks?

I would like to try some of the quince varieties from the germplasm 
repository, but from what I understand the commercially available quince 
rootstocks are not hardy enough for our Zone 4 site.  Hence, the search 
for another understock option . . . .

I ran across a message in the archives (pasted below) from 2002 and was 
wondering if Lucky had tried what he proposed and if so, the results of 
that trial.


Thanks,
Anton Ptak
Zone 4a W. Wisconsin

Lucky,
There was a multi-stemmed volunteer bush in the backyard.   The leaves looked 
very similar to a hawthorn growing in the front yard - so I guessed it
was a hawthorn.  I had scions of three pears - including Magness and Warren - 
and grafted all onto it.   As well as a seedling Quince a Michigan
NAFEXer had sent me.  They all took, and suvived.  Last year my ''hawthorn'' 
started bearing crabapples, and the leaves on the maturing bush stopped
looking like hawthorn and started looking like crabapple.  By now only one 
pear scion, a Magness survives.  The Quince is still on there, and
survives better than the pears, but hasn't flowered or borne fruit.  I still 
haven't found anything to graft the Quince off of the crabapple onto
something else, because I don't have any other quince.
Yes, I'd go ahead and graft your Quince onto pear and hawthorn, if it can 
survive with me on crabapple, it should at least survive and possibly
thrive on pear or hawthorn.
Charlie Paradise
Massachusetts

Lucky Pittman wrote:

> In the past, we've discussed grafting pear cultivars onto quince &/or
> hawthorn rootstocks, but does anyone have any experience doing the reciprocal?
>
> A friend sent me some "Aromatnaya" quince scions - but I have no quince
> seedlings to work them onto - plenty of pear & hawthorn, but no quince.  I
> wondered if anyone had any words of encouragement - I've already grafted
> scions onto a couple of pears and a hawthorn, so if you're gonna warn me
> not to, don't waste your time typing 8>)
>
> Progress report of sorts:  3 years ago, I grafted "Ayers" pear onto what I
> had purchased as a seedling pear rootstock, but last spring, after closer
> examination, I determined that it was an apple seedling.  The 3-yr old
> graft, an unbranched whip only about 4 ft tall, bloomed profusely this
> spring.  If it escapes frost/freeze damage, I suspect I'll have to thin
> pretty severely. I did cut scions off it this spring to re-graft onto a
> known pear rootstock, in the event that it doesn't survive long on it's
> apple root.
>
> Lucky Pittman
> USDA Zone 6
> Hopkinsville, KY