Grafting in the Forest Garden:

Grafting is primarily used to propagate fruit trees in the Forest Garden to accelerate production and select for desirable traits across species they are growing. 

Farmers benefit from it most by selecting the best scions. For example, many types of trees do not produce high quality fruit when grown from seed. So, if a fruit tree produces high quality and quantity yields, Forest Gardeners can graft a scion from that tree onto the rootstock of a tree planted from seed. The new tree that grows from the scion will be exactly like the tree that it was taken from. Grafting allows farmers to maintain the desirable quality of a select fruit tree, which is essential for generating maximum income. 

Additionally, grafting allows Forest Gardeners to accelerate the rate at which their fruit trees will produce. Typically, a non-grafted fruit tree can take anywhere from 5 to 10 years to produce fruit. With this technique, however, the growth process can be accelerated, and certain grafted fruit trees can produce as early as 2-4 years.