Jolene. I have two apple trees with multi-grafts. These are a few lessons that I have learned.

-Use disease resistant varieties
-The lower limbs should be the ones with the most vigor.
-Requires more maintenance (I enjoy the maintenance).
-Does not require additional trees for cross-pollination.
-My labor on these trees is a labor of love, as yours seem to be.

Hope this helps, Bill

I don't have any photos, but stepped up my multigrafting this year due to encouraging results so far. You would be pruning anyway so no problem with pruning for variety balance. There are different growth rates within a tree of same species anyway. If you don't like the result of a particular variety you can fix it with pruning and regrafting. And lastly as far as looking hodge podge, can't know what he might be envisioning, but when there are visual differences, like fruit color it looks cool.

If you think the differing growth rates make the tree lopsided and ugly, try losing a graft or two.

However, even single variety trees can sometimes be stubborn to fill in open areas after losing a branch. This is especially true if the open area is on the north side.

I've done a lot of grafts onto my difficult-to-manage Liberty, and I highly recommend it. It is a good way to get good variety in your selection and you will learn a huge amount about trees and apples. (You will also want to take a chainsaw to the base of your trees from time to time, but it passes.)

As stated above, there are some management issues, and it makes sense to graft the more vigorous varieties lower on the tree, and pointed toward the north, and so on. But as you learn about pruning you'll bring it under control in time.

I suggest a central leader pruning system. It's straightforward to manage and makes good use of space. As a point of reference, Christmas trees are central leader trees. But many lovely trees are done with an open center, or vase. That works too.

Main thing is to just get in there in do it.

Good luck to you!

Thanks for the feedback. We grafted over a couple of trees this year with good success. Every graft grew, and we only lost one to a hail storm.

Now I want to graft over a couple of Rome beauties (I have three) and a Gala ( I have three of them too)

I was thinking about putting five or six on each,
working each major limb to a different new variety.

I guess we still have time to think about it.

"Working each major limb to a different variety" is a good idea.

I've stuck things here and there on my tree and sometimes it gets difficult to keep track of, let alone manage!

It becomes more difficult to graft successfully to lower limbs as the trees get bigger and secrete more competition-reducing hormones from above. So plan your grafting to the first scaffold and work up; also, graft close to the trunk.

I've thought about asking the people on this board to help me design a tree or two, planning perhaps a dozen or sixteen total scaffold branches, staggered for vigor, ripening, and perhaps color/pattern. You might want your early apples low, so you could harvest them without damaging the later ones, for example, or there could be any number of things I haven't thought of.

Thanks for the feedback. We grafted over a couple of trees this year with good success. Every graft grew, and we only lost one to a hail storm.

Now I want to graft over a couple of Rome beauties (I have three) and a Gala ( I have three of them too)

I was thinking about putting five or six on each,
working each major limb to a different new variety.

I guess we still have time to think about it.

I have multigrafted stonefruit... no issues other then some varieties will outgrow others and you need to keep that in check. Sometimes you need to cut back hard to get vigorous new growth (not sure if the same applies for apples). It is neat seeing different colors/varieties on the same tree.

Thanks for the feedback. We grafted over a couple of trees this year with good success. Every graft grew, and we only lost one to a hail storm.

Now I want to graft over a couple of Rome beauties (I have three) and a Gala ( I have three of them too)

I was thinking about putting five or six on each,
working each major limb to a different new variety.

I guess we still have time to think about it.

I have no idea why or how that got posted three times. Sorry about the repetition.
We have a fair sized orchard of 45 apple trees. I guess I'm just a variety glutton.
I would like to find out how feasible it is to grow multi grafts, partly because I think doing custom grafted trees for folks would be fun.

The other reason for testing varieties would because we would like to plant a larger orchard, of maybe 200 trees in a couple of years. Finding extraordinary varieties, and those that do well here, would help the selection process.

Thanks for all the great info.

Greetings:

I chip budded some heirloom apples onto some young
existing trees. So far it looks like 75% of the buds have
calloused nicely. I will see next spring how they fare.

I do plan on painting the base of each branch that I budded
on the mother tree so I can easily find the buds next spring.
I also do not want to prune off the branches next March when pruning!

I decided I do not need more fruit trees (22 is plenty) but I always want more varieties. Budding more onto some of my younger trees is my answer. If the trees are not perfectly shaped due to some varieties being slower than
others, I do not care. I grow them for fruit not shade so their shape is not an issue.

I can only dream of the beautiful grafted trees I picked on
years ago that had red and yellow apples on them due to a
different variety grafted to them by the owner. They did it as a hobby on a few of their trees. One had red apples except the 4 lowest branches which were all gold apple.
Mighty pretty in fall.