Kelly Day, age 13, of Scarboro, Maine, for his question:

Can a tree grow from a seedless orange?

If you plant a seedless orange, it cannot sprout a root or a shoot. It is attacked by bacteria and other micro organisms, by mites and various small dwellers in the soil. It soon becomes a pulpy mush and as it continues to decay, its complex molecules are broken apart into usable nutrients to feed other plants. However, there are various methods for duplicating plants without depending on seeds. Growers of seedless oranges use the grafting method.

We are told that our future food. supplies depend on how well we learn to work with the methods of nature. This sane idea brings a bonus. We can improve on nature's best and even produce entirely new plants. One of these sophisticated results is the seedless orange. Usually it is a late season Valencia orange. And it may be called seedless, even though a few of these big, extra meaty fruits do have a few seeds.

All our fragrant, flavorsome oranges, of course, were developed from wild types,. Wild orange trees tend to bear stingy little fruits, often sour and stringy. Hut they have two advantages. They can cope with the rigors of soil, climate and many diseases. And their stingy little fruits contain seeds. When they fall or get carried far a field by birds, some of the seeds sprout and become more wild orange trees,

Orange growers do not depend on seeds to grow the trees they want. Each fancy orchard tree is a grafted union of two trees, each with special qualities. The root, called the rootstock, comes from a sturdy wild or half wild tree, able to withstand hardship and resist common citrus diseases. The trunk and branches grow from a twig, or scion, taken from a tree that bears seedless or other superior oranges.

There are several ways to graft the rootstock and scion. But all of them depend on the slim layer of cambium under the bark of a woody trunk or twig. Cambium cells are multipliers that produce layers of new growth for the bark and for the wood. When the cambium of the scion and rootstock are held in contact, they grow together and form a union.

This is grafting. The secret is to place the two cambium layers in close contact, tie them securely and seal up the surgery. The rootstock for a seedless orange may be a young bitter orange or a rough lemon, a sturdy lime or a wild sweet orange. Its sapling trunk is cut to a stump and some of the bark is cut and peeled to expose the cambium. The scion twig or twigs are from a select tree bearing seedless oranges. The grafting grows together and in time, the sturdy rootstock supports the seedless orange treetop.

It is possible to get some results from an orange pip, even from the rare one we may find inside a seedless orange. With a lot of pampering, in suitable soil and warm sunny air, the seed may sprout. Its slow growing twigs may grow handsome glossy orange leaves. In time it may bear a few fragrant blossoms that just might form stingy little fruits like those that grow on the child ancestors of the rootstock.