Grafting fruit trees

[BiancaMoon]

Hello,

Does anyone know can you use stablished fruit trees to graft on them species that are not suitable for that temperature?

If this is unclear let me explain, in a climate where winters go to to about -10'C can I use established apple trees and try to graft on them mango, orange, etc. - species that die at these temperatures?

Thank you.

[LadyWYT]

Now that I'm not sure. It's worth trying, given that the worst that happens is it doesn't work. Bear in mind though that grafting has an even lower chance of success than standard cuttings.

[Professor Dragon]

Unless something has changed, no.

The graft must be of a similar temperature variation tree to the host.

"A grafted cutting, even if successful, does not completely integrate with the host tree. It will keep the temperature requirements of its own type, and every leaf block calculates these independently. This results in an important point to keep in mind when preparing and caring for a graft"

[Bumber]

Is there a practical application for this feature, or is it just for showing off?

Seems like you'd get more fruit from growing a separate tree, and the chances of success are better.

[Professor Dragon]

53 minutes ago, Bumber said:

Is there a practical application for this feature, or is it just for showing off?

Seems like you'd get more fruit from growing a separate tree, and the chances of success are better.

Both. 
It is mostly for showing off.

However, if space was super tight, such as a greenhouse, you could put multiple fruit tree types into the one area.
From a food perspective, there is not a lot of point to that apart from the different cropping times.
And it is easy enough to get more space for fruit trees.

It has decorative uses:

• According to the wiki, it makes fruit trees one block wider.
  I can't say that I've seen that myself, never having done it. And I thought regular fruit trees could go out three blocks anyway (???).
• However definitely, you can get different colour blossom on the one tree, and different fruits of course.

I suspect that it is an undeveloped feature, where they are leaving room to add more features to fruit trees, such as grafting different temperature regions to trees. That's just a guess though.

Professor Dragon.

[BiancaMoon]

Thank you for the answers. I had a crazy luck with fruit trees so now I have a lot of alive ones, but I want to do some experiments.

Because I am in the warm zone it is hell to actually get fruit trees to bare fruit. The hot varieties die in the winter as temps go to -4, but the cold varieties don't get enough of cold time to vernalize making my oldest trees on their second year, mature form (bottom leaves fallen off, 6 blocks high) but no fruit, still young. 

The first experiment I am trying is to plant hot zone fruit trees at the end of the winter to be vernalized right away and to try to get them to bare fruit before next winter, collect fruit, collect branch and let it die and repeat the cycle. Right now the only one I managed to start was a single orange. If you look at the photos it was vernalized the moment it got first leaves, it is bearing fruit and growing, with each new branch growing with fruit already on it. However I think it will not make it to ripening because it has 30 more days and I am in September...

I also need to see will year 2 be enough for all the apples, cherries, pears and peaches to finally mature...

Finally I have a stockpile of mango branches I will try to graft on apples and cherries to see if they die during winter, does the branch die or the whole tree dies, or the branch is just dormant. I just need to wait the winter to see which ones vernalize so I can sacrifice the ones that don't as the wait is too long now - two years! I don't want to kill the trees I have been waiting for so long.

[Professor Dragon]

Great experimentation. I look forward to the results!

See if you can scrape together enough glass to put a small greenhouse around that orange tree for the +5C bonus.
If anyone is not up to tools or bloomery yet, then use regular quartz that you find on the ground to make glass in the early game. You only need enough for half the roof for the greenhouse bonus, and the rest of the structure can be can any solid block, such as rammed earth.

Edited November 21, 2025 by Professor Dragon

[BiancaMoon]

Professor Dragon that is an excellent idea!

I can make a lot of glass fast, have ton of refractory bricks for bloomeries and couple of stacks of quartz. But the thing is die off temps for hot zone fruits are quite high for winter. Orange is lowest - 5'C and olive is 7'C. I see in the table that orange can go to 1'C but the problem is the winter here goes to at least -4'C meaning it would be a waste of materials if it goes even the slightest below.

However if all of the cold zone fruits do not vernalize this year (currently in September) I will actually build a green house with purpose to try to get oranges going - the only possible fruit to survive the winter, and test it. I have a nice place for this all dug up and flattened already.

 

Cheers! 

 

[BiancaMoon]

So first update, it is December now with temperatures going to -2, and long periods with temps under 5'C.

The orange has stoically survived about 5 days with temps going to -1'C, and second day of -2'C died as well as many new planted oranges.

Anything from hot zone except oranges dies instantly at 0 to -1'C that I can see. But if the temps stay above 0'C they can survive for few days.

What I can conclude is that fruit trees take damage under the die off temperature just like crops. They need some hours under die off temperature to really die.

Hot zone fruit trees also can not be stretched to fruit before cold temperatures in the warm zone and need to be placed in the greenhouse. I am testing which ones can survive in it - mango, orange, lychee.

Cold zone fruit trees so apples, pears cherries and peaches can of course survive but not a single one vernalized so far. For apples and pears this has been year 2, and for cherries and peaches first cold year. I will wait for them until April as cold temps start to give up around that time. If they do not vernalize they will be cut and used for cooking...

[BiancaMoon]

A very quick update that neither mango nor lychee can survive in warm zone in the greenhouse during winter. It takes just one night of -2'C to kill them, while oranges are enduring.

[LadyWYT]

2 hours ago, BiancaMoon said:

A very quick update that neither mango nor lychee can survive in warm zone in the greenhouse during winter.

It might depend on where in the warm zone you're located. I had a map with a warm start, and settled reasonably close to the spawn. I planted some lychee without greenhouses, and the trees seem to do well. The warm zone does have warm spots suitable for lychee to spawn naturally, so it should also be warm enough for lychee to survive, however, it may have pockets of temperate climate that will kill off more cold-sensitive plants.

[BiancaMoon]

50 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

It might depend on where in the warm zone you're located.

This is why I am giving temperatures.

[ScarletFox]

I realize you might have stopped your experiments but you can modify the local temperature for the trees by planting them at different elevations.

For every 10 blocks higher than sea level the average temperature gets colder by about 1.5C.  This also applies to below sea level where the reverse is true and it gets warmer.  The caveat to this is if you don’t have the “Underground Farming Allowed” option selected you aren’t supposed to be able to grow anything below 19ish blocks below sea level.  But that still allows approximately +3C to the average temp. Edit: And if you were already building higher than sea level simply lowering it to sea level will increase the average temperature.

One of my goals is to someday make a tiered garden from y-level 0 to 256 or whatever the build height is set to at the time.

Edited December 16, 2025 by ScarletFox