The cleft is a man made split that wants to naturally close when done correctly. A natural split is caused by gravity or other forces associated with a load on that portion of the tree. Weight is an example cause of a natural split. The natural split would likely be brought on by wood ants eating away at some of the structural support , dry rot etc. the weight of the live healthy branches and gravity cause the split. With a man made split the wood is all healthy which therefore heals over quickly. If the cleft is no larger than needed and the scion is not to large the cleft split will not expand.
In the case of the rootstock in the photo I’m grafting, the split will not go down past the knot you see as a lump a little farther down. It is actually holding the scion very tightly, it takes a bit of force to push it in this far. You can tell when you get good cambium contact, you feel it “grab” as you push the two together. Taping it up is more for moisture preservation than securing it. I cut the scion off just above the first bud, and tape it first with vinyl tape for the graft and then Parafilm for the scion. It can survive shipping halfway across the world without getting knocked out of place.
I’ll try to get some photos this afternoon how to graft a scion larger than the rootstock with a cleft graft.
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While your at it Kevin, it would be great to see how you cut the scion wood and rootstock with your utility cutter, thanks.
Sorry, my question wasn’t very clear. I wouldn’t be concerned with the cleft propagating after grafting, I’m talking about during the cleft cut, and while spreading to insert the scion.
The cleft usually stops at a knot; in fact, it takes a wedge or something to hold it open to stick the scion in. The split running isn’t a problem, especially if you have a long taper on your scion (I use about 1-1/2" depending on the scion thickness).
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Here’s the cutter. I hone the utility knife blade to be sharper than the factory hone. It tends to split out the bottom of the cut when doing the scion “V” shape, but it doesn’t matter since it’s the top you’re trying to align. Note the mark on the blade to say how deep to split the rootstock.
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How about a video now? 
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Mark - do you use your clippers to make the cuts on the scion, or do you do it with a knife?
Also, Mark, which one do you like better or have more success with, the simple splice (via nippers) or the cleft?
Bart, I started doing splice grafts Alan’s way: cut both the stock and the scion with the clippers, stick 'em together, and wrap. (The precut tape is already hanging on the stock, waiting and ready.)
On clefts I use a knife, laboriously and gracelessly whittling away at my poor scion in an attempt to convince it that I am its master. Sometimes it works. Well, mostly, in fact, but I do have trouble getting everything just as I think it should be. With pear and apple and the occasional plum I get away with it. Apricot not so- but I’ll blame the temperature as much as my technique for that. Here it can be difficult to get enough days that are warm enough for the apricots to callous reliably. I’ve only ever succeeded with apricot using a chip graft.
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Apricots are a son of a gun to graft. I’ve blamed the temperature, the scions, the rootstock , heck I even blamed myself all to no avail. There are people that graft them like Bob Purvis but the truth is even if I ever get good at grafting them I might get fruit once every 6 years.
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Good to know, thanks!
I’ve been practicing and with a knife, I’m pretty horrible, but I think I can do a decent “wedge” on a scion to insert into a cleft graft, and I’ve had some good success matching up the wood for a splice graft using nippers.
There’s no way I can do a saddle graft or a whip and tongue at this point with my knife skills so I’ll rely on the other two.
Thanks!
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In all seriousness Bart weather is a lot of the problem 70 degrees one day and 20 the next day in Kansas is not unusual. The last time I grafted apricots they were the only thing that didn’t take besides peaches. I grafted in the 60s-70s and it dropped in the teens and stayed awhile. Pears , plums, apples were all fine but peaches, cherries, apricots not so much. Some of the cherries took and none of the peaches and apricots.
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They’re both pretty reliable and straightforward. I’ll do a splice with nippers anytime the wood is close in size and not very big. Clefts are great with mismatched wood- you can take a pencil of a scion and stick it into a 4" trunk; I haven’t done it with wood that big, but it’s done regularly and readily. I do use the cleft if the stock is say, 3/4" or larger, and in that case I’m likely to put two scions into the same cut (one on each side) so that I can pick and choose the better later.
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Bart- Whip and tongue I find is fun to do. Tips I might give- be in no hurry and cut the tongue very, very slowly, start with the blade almost flat against the wood; use a rocking motion to gently move the blade down, keep absolute control of the blade… Put thick leather glove on your non-knife hand, learned that the hard way. And use a very sharp knife. Start the tongue cut one-third (not one-half) the way down the already cut surface. My two cents.
More: I find my first diagonal cut on the scion or stock comes out straighter and flatter the more power and speed I make the cut with. I use John Daly’s (golfer) famous tip: “Grip it and Rip it.” is my motto for this first diagonal cut. But my tongue cut is the opposite: precise, slow, controlled. Hope this helps.
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What Hambone said- plus, the wood has to be supple for this to work. Dry, brittle wood will not play nice.
Also, don’t jam the two pieces together too far- once they fit, they fit, and pushing them further will only make a nasty bulge.
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Shout out to Applenut. I bought one of the Craftsman Utility cutters to see if it lived up to his hype. I got it today and monkeyed with it a bit on some scion wood that I had already in the scion fridge. I think I am going to like it!!! Even for just splitting root stock on cleft grafts it will be a huge time saver. With a little more experimenting I think I can even do W/T on 1/4" wood.
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Applenut, I’ve been using a utility cutter similar to yours for years for whip grafts. But I’ve never tried to sharpen the blades. Could you detail how you do that. Since it’s an anvil cutter, it would help to have the blade sharper than it is when new.
Sharpening them maybe of benefit, but I found the new blades to be plenty sharp yesterday. You can buy replacement utility blades fairly cheap.
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I’m a woodworker and have a pretty sophisticated sharpener http://www.sharpeningsupplies.com/Tormek-C101.aspx?gclid=CJr_2I7WgcsCFYY_aQodUPwLkw It uses a felt wheel at slow speed that you put a buffing compound on. The blade ends up with a mirror finish, and the performance is quite above the factory sharpness. I use the same thing on the blade on my utility knife.
This way you can slice your finger with a nice, clean cut that glues together well in the emergency room.
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