Today, we started cutting down trees in our block of Kanza trees to complete our orchard thinning plan (photo at right). Because Kanza is such a popular cultivar for northern pecan growers, we took advantage of having trees on the ground to cut scions from the long shoots that are usually found only at the very tops of the canopy.
After setting down the chainsaw, I walked over to the tree's canopy in search of great scionwood. Most of the shoots on the lower portion of the tree's canopy had limited one-year-old growth (photo at left). These 6 to 8 inch long shoots might be great for setting a crop of nuts but they are too small to make good scions.
The one-year-old shoots at the very top of the tree were 2 to 3 feet in length, had plenty of buds, and were 1/2 to 5/8 inch in diameter (photo at right). These shoots make great scions.
The photo at left shows you where I cut the one-year-old shoot from the tree. To the right of the clippers, note the large prominent buds on last year's wood. To the left of the clippers, the two-year-old wood has lost all its primary buds and making it a poor choice for scionwood.
We cut our scions 7 to 8 inch long and place them in a plastic container (photo at right). Before adding scions to the box, we place a bed of paper towels at the bottom of the container. Once the box is full of scions, we cover the wood with several more sheets of paper towel. Before storing the wood in a cooler, we pour cup of water over the paper towels to add moisture to the container. The paper towels above and below the scions absorb the water, then act as a wick to keep the air inside the box at 100% relative humidity. Coupled with storage at 36 degrees F, the plastic boxes and wet paper towels will keep the scion fresh until grafting time.
