Professor Lake: That part below the scion still continues to be normal hickory, and that part above, pecan, so really it is not a matter of distribution of water supply by gravity or other pressure, but rather a distribution of the proper amount of elaborated food; and that is transmitted through the cell itself, not the cell walls. Because this top makes a food that is different from the normal requirements, or because the latent character of those cells below does not respond to the food supply as actively as the part above, is the whole question, it seems to me. If the cells below functioned as the cells above, there would be no question about the stock and scion being the same.
Mr. Littlepage: Of course there must be sufficient flow of sap to distribute food. The hickory root might not send the flow of sap as fast as the pecan top would like.
Mr. Reed: Is Mr. Lake's point always true, that the stock below the point of union remains a normal hickory?
Professor Craig: I don't believe there are more than one or two exceptions noted to that, and those exceptions are recorded under graft hybrids.
Mr. Reed: A seedling pecan tree owned by Mr. B. M. Young of Morgan City, Louisiana, was top worked with scions from the McAllister hican some seven or eight feet above ground, and later on the bark of the pecan trunk below the point of union became scaly like that of the hican above.
Professor Lake: That would suggest something worth while, if that part below would produce fruit like the part above, but I would want to question a little the modification in bark characteristics being a direct result of cross grafting.
Mr. Reed: Of course, it was no check—only one instance.
Professor Craig: There are one or two others that are authentic. I have known a case of plum. Here we have the plum stock, we will say it is Prunus Americana, grafted with Prunus triflora, the Japanese, then later on, Prunus domestica is put on top. I have seen a sprout from triflora bearing Japanese plums, while the top of the tree bore Prunus domestica, although there was only a small section of stem in there between our two distinct species. They were perfectly normal.
President Morris: Each elaborates its own kind of food in its own kind of cell. I would like to hear from Mr. Brown and Mr. Wilcox on this matter of grafting—the influence of stock on scion.
Mr. Wilcox: We had a good show of stocks, but instead of allowing them to become established in the pots, we grafted them as they started into growth after rooting. Had they been established, we would have expected better results.