Forestal Catalana’s Stone Pine Grafting Program In Catalonia. Production Of Grafted Plant In Nursery

Abstract

The forestry sector in Spain faces the need to develop more attractive and profitable products. One of the most valuable in the Mediterranean forest is the pinenut which use in the local cuisine is ancestral. Moreover, its nutritional value is highly appreciated and currently the world demand is far from being covered. But its production still comes from naturals stands and a certain degree of domestication is required to increase the offer. First step was to select highly productive clones and the second to verify the grafted plants improve the entry into production. Now it is time to achieve a good level of grafting success to exploit the potential of these genotypes. More than 7,300 grafts were made for four years to identify factors that influence grafting success: scion quality, grafting period, clone origin, grafter experience, etc. The results shown that the average grafting success is up to 82.6% over four years, with slight variations depending on the grafter experience or climatic conditions. The importance to achieve suitable scions for grafting is highlighted, leading to the establishment of officially commissioned mother fields to produce FRM, scions of the registered genotypes. The work concludes that the main current challenge is not the grafting process itself, but the need to increase scion production to supply the current demand for Stone pine grafted plants.