Layer or Graft?????

[Gerard]

I have a grafted hawthorn with a nice pink flower, whenever I see hawthorns they are typically white flowering and often collected from the wild.
The pink ones seem to be grafted .......always?
This lead me to consider that perhaps air layering is not likely to be a successful propogation method.
Should we draw these conclusions?
If nurserymen choose grafting as the method of propogation for a species of tree, should we take this into account when contemplating an air layer?
An unsuccessful air layer can leave ugly scars on the trunk!
This question also applies to many crabapples.

[shibui]

Hi Gerard,

I have a grafted hawthorn with a nice pink flower, whenever I see hawthorns they are typically white flowering and often collected from the wild.
The pink ones seem to be grafted .......always?
This lead me to consider that perhaps air layering is not likely to be a successful propogation method.
Should we draw these conclusions?

This is not always the case. Take Granny Smith fruiting apple - always sold grafted but grows very well on its own roots. Granny seedlings are used extensively as rootstocks for crab apples. They are probably grafted to a selected rootstock for a couple of reasons - A semi dwarfing rootstock is usually used to limit the ultimate height of the resulting tree as Granny Smith is a very vigorous tree and would grow to 6m or more on its own roots; and - Wholesalers who produce fruit trees are set up to propagate by grafting rather than cuttings, layers or other methods so they just graft everything they produce whether it needs it or not.
On the other hand, some garden plant selections have very roor natural roots and need to be grafted to keep them alive - Weeping dissectum japanese maples spring to mind as being in this category.

I know that Ray Nesci sells ungrafted crabapple varieties so he must grow them from cuttings. I have had one crabapple refuse to strike roots as a layer years ago so it may depend on variety or perhaps I was not holding my mouth right that day. I have not tried again so do not know.

I'm not sure about the pink hawthorn but I will be putting in some cuttings this year to see how it goes.