Nice thinking! Do you have any thoughts on what type of graft seems to work best for jujube? I was starting to think it was the fact I cleft grafted it. I whip and tongued apple, pears and pawpaws and got great results with all of them. The only cleft grafts I used we’re on the jujubes and they all bled and failed. Do you think whip and tongue would help, or was it mostly my timing? I’m trying to figure out still if I was too early or too late…
@Nagrom I have good success with bark grafting jujubes. The grafts aren’t as strong as whip and tongue, but I think it’s easier to get good cambium contact, and I splint the grafts with a bamboo stake. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFLwOWe0KQ4
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I like doing cleft grafts. Anything with similar diameters gets them. I use bark grafts for thin scions, though it only works once the trees have really started to wake up, as the bark doesn’t “slip” before that.
I’ve had that happen with grapes and maybe mulberries, but I’ve never seen that with jujubes. Maybe it is more prevalent in your warmer climate?
How wide of scions do you use for bark grafts? Most of mine have been medium thin or smaller, so I may not be seeing the same results. The sense I have is that my bark grafts often don’t grow as much in the first year as cleft grafts, though I haven’t tried to look into the data.
Here’s the data I captured one time for cleft grafts. Interestingly, the place I found it was in this same thread, about 1700 posts ago in 2021 
| Size | Grafts | Takes | Pct |
|---|---|---|---|
| Thin (<= 2mm) | 12 | 9 | 75% |
| Medium Thin (3mm) | 19 | 15 | 79% |
| Medium (4mm) | 26 | 23 | 88% |
| Medium Large (5mm) | 34 | 32 | 94% |
| Large (6-7mm) | 35 | 31 | 89% |
| Large-Very Large (8mm) | 13 | 10 | 77% |
| Very Large+ (>=9mm) | 18 | 10 | 56% |
| 157 | 130 | 83% |
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I use bark grafts for all diameters of scions, but the ideal is about the width of a pencil. I usually do my bark grafts a little differently than Dr. Yao. I just took some photos of a demonstration graft with persimmon wood to show how I do them.
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Rather than one sloping cut, I make a crosswise cut through the scion and then shave off wood until I have a thin wedge on one end:
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On the bark side of the wedge, I make a small cut at the tip the same way that Dr. Yao does in her video, but then I shave off the edge of the bark on each side of the wedge to expose additional cambium. I often put this wedge end of the scion in my mouth while I’m preparing the rootstock to keep it moist (unless it’s a toxic plant that I don’t want to suck on like pawpaw)
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Next I cut the rootstock with my pruning shears and make a shallow vertical cut in the bark almost as long as the wedge on my scion. I loosen these two flaps of bark before sliding the wedge of the scion under the bark.
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Here is the completed graft before wrapping it up with rubber bands followed by parafilm. I will often wrap the scion with parafilm before I start cutting the wedge just to avoid having to move it a lot after I’ve finished grafting. I like the way the “L” shape of this scion fits snugly against the cut end of the rootstock. When I initially did bark grafts the way Dr. Yao showed in her video with a straight cut instead of this “L” in the scion, it’s easy for me to push the scion too far and split the rootstock bark below the two flaps when I’m inserting the scion.
I think the additional step of exposing cambium along both sides of the wedge increases the success rate of this type of bark graft because the whole length of the wedge (usually 1-1.5 inches) on both sides is in contact with the cambium on the inside of the bark of the rootstock.
The main drawback is that the thin wedge isn’t very strong. On a well-established rootstock, this scion can put on several feet of growth in one season. In strong winds, this can snap off the scion at the graft, so I like to splint the graft union with a bamboo stake for at least a year until it is completely healed.
Another challenge I faced with Dr. Yao’s method was with thicker scions. Sometimes my bark flaps wouldn’t cover as much of the wedge as I would like after I inserted it into the cut in the rootstock, or there would be a significant gap between the edges of the wedge and the overlapping bark after insertion. That’s why I prefer to make thinner wedges, even on thicker scions, so that it inserts easily and makes good contact with the insides of the bark flaps of the rootstock.
This type of bark graft doesn’t require much skill and takes quite a bit longer to cut the scion, but I’m not in a hurry or very nimble with my grafting knife.
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That looks hard to do. When I make the wedge, I just push the blade down on both sides (middle toward the end) to make the point. The hardest part being to keep both sides cut fairly even in terms of thickness.
But for yours, I’m not sure how you make it so even and a nice 90 degree angle with the first (I think) cut.
Just to confirm, you make the blue cut first, then the yellow cut?
And when you make the yellow cut, you push the blade from the middle toward the end, or from the end of the stick toward the blue 90 degree cut?
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@BobVance Thanks for asking… I agree, I don’t think it would be possible to make a 90 degree angle with just two cuts, especially with wood as hard as jujube. For me, it’s a whole series of 10-20 cuts to get to what you see in that picture. I make the blue cut first, but my second cut is a back cut at about 45 deg to meet the bottom of the first cut and make a notch in the wood. Then I make a series of additional back cuts to expand this notch. I may need to make more additional crosswise cuts to deepen the initial cut. I continue this until I can get my knife blade flat along the bottom of the notch and cut away from me towards the tip of the wedge and create the 90 degree angle. Then I flip the scion over and make a small 45 degree cut at the tip to expose cambium and sharpen it for insertion into the bark flaps of the rootstock.
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I should also note that I wear a cut-resistant wool glove on the hand I use to hold the scion so I don’t accidentally slice myself with one of the back cuts…
Your graft is very similar to Konrad’s bark graft, but he doesn’t make that perpendicular cut into the wood he just scoops it out there with the knife. I do my own minor variation of Konrad’s graft. Its a great graft, the only issue is things need to be stabilized or they will break in a strong wind.
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I just do an easy 4 to 5 cut cleft graft. Parafilm the whole scion. Wrap a rubber band up and down the whole union. Use a small strip of black electric tape over the rubber band so the sun won’t break it down until the graft starts taking off. The whole process takes about 4 minutes per graft. I am close to 100% take. Easy peasy!
Tony
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This type of graft certainly isn’t original to me, and I probably got my inspiration to try it from Konrad. I know it was something on this forum, but I wouldn’t have been able to remember what it was, so thanks for making the connection to Konrad’s bark graft and giving credit where it’s due. I agree - reinforcement is particularly important for this type of graft. Jujubes have such hard wood that even a thin wedge has quite a bit of strength. But on other trees I’ve used this graft like pears and persimmons, their large leaves catch the wind and snap this graft very easily. I’ve learned the hard way that I need to reinforce all my grafts because even whip-and-tongue and cleft grafts can break in a storm.
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You’re right - this type of bark graft requires more cutting than you’d need in most cases. I don’t find jujubes hard to graft whatever type of graft I use. I’ve used cleft grafts and whip-and-tongue grafts on jujubes too with an equally good success rate. But since jujube wood is so hard, sometimes it’s not easy for me to get the cuts to line up well as I’d like, and I feel like this bark graft is more foolproof in getting the cambium to line up well even if it involves some extra cuts. I can do this bark graft in about 4-5 minutes too, and I think it requires less finesse with a knife and has more flexibility because matching up diameters of the scion and rootstock doesn’t matter at all. I only do about 20-30 grafts a year, so I’m not that concerned about speed. I’m sure I would feel differently if I had hundreds or thousands to do each year.
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Thanks for the pics. I think I get it now. I’ll check to see if I still have some suitable scionwood to give it a try with.
I don’t ever reinforce my bark grafts, but it hasn’t been an issue since they grow so little in the first year. Generally only inches. In future years, they can put on some growth. But, I think that may come down to using such thin/tiny scions. Your method looks to allow for larger scions, which would rip the bark with my normal method.
I generally have good success rates, but have more trouble getting strong growth in the first year. Maybe this method will allow a better initial connection and stronger growth.
I’ve settled down to about 300/yr for the last few years (I think 600 was my peak, about 10 years ago). This year, I’m all the way down to 150. I’ve been gradually learning that grafting at the ends of branches is a waste of time- it’s more important to carve a larger section of the tree out, rather than having a tree with dozens of grafts on it.
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While my stocks are running a bit low at this point in grafting season, I was able to locate some large scionwood. I also found a couple large grafting sites on a Li which already has 6 varieties (I made sure to add metal tags as backups, as this tree is getting pretty busy).
I used a ~1/2" diameter scion on a 3/4"+ host and a 1/4-3/8" scion on a 5/8" host, so both scions (Bing Tang- can never have too much of it ) were pretty large.
I found the first cut a lot easier to make with pruners, rather than trying to force the knife through. I was having a hard time cutting and felt like I risked cutting all the way through if I added enough force.
It took a lot of cutting to get the mass of wood excavated. Note the leather glove. I used to cut myself enough that I started always putting it on my left hand whenever the knife was in my right. In the last 2-3 years, the combination of always cutting away from my body when making the scion spear and getting better with applying force (and keeping the tip of the branch positioned to stop my knife hand before the blade gets to the other hand) had allowed me to stop using the glove. But this method really needs it, both for the back-cuts and to support the long section, so that it isn’t snapped off when smoothing it out.
I did have to narrow the scion a bit further (those last 2 side cuts before the 45 deg tip cut) in order to make it fit under the 2 bark slips. And even then, it was a bit tight.
2nd graft (note that it was getting dark, which didn’t help):
This was actually the 2nd time I tried to fit this scion in. The first time I did it, the slit in the bark wasn’t quite long enough and ripped at the bottom when I forced the scion in.
1st graft:
It definitely took a lot longer than bark grafts I’ve made in the past. But, I’m sure I could shave down the time a bit with practice. And even if I only did this with a few grafts that I particularly care about, it would be a useful tool.
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I did one like your 2nd graft for the first time yesterday. I was grafting to a persimmon rootstock and the bark was slipping great but very thin. Perhaps I should have done a cleft graft, but instead I thinned out the scion so it didn’t need so much volume under the bark.
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I’ve got a Li and a Sugarcane. They’ve been flowering for what seems like quite a while now. It’s been cool and overcast/rainy like 3/4ths of the time in the last month and a half, so stuff seems to be progressing more slowly this year, but how long does flowering usually last? I see some have (presumably) closed, but am not noticing any tiny fruitlets yet. Hundreds of flowers and they’re like 9’ tall, so I’m hoping to get a decent crop this year.
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My old, sad transplant, transplants are doing things.
It looks like to me that the rootstock of one is growing too, because of the darker leaves. If I let it grow would it be a boon for pollination?
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You can save one root sprout to pollinate your me main cultivar and rub off the rest. You want the majority of nutrients going to feed the main cultivar.
Tony
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