Propagating plants a core skill
PROPAGATING plants is a core skill for all gardeners, collecting and sowing seeds, dividing herbaceous plants, layering, air layering, grafting and budding, the many methods of cuttings and today even micropropagation from tissue culture. All are methods of getting many plants from a parent plant and if you do this yourself all it will cost you is a little compost perhaps. Some of these technics are for the highly trained professional nurseryman but others, another expression, are as easy as falling off a log.
Growing from seeds is generally straight forward and even easiers is the division of herbaceous plants. Cuttings or ‘slips’ as they are colloquially called can be both tricky and sublimely easy.There are three main terms used to describe cutting propagation material, softwood, semi- hardwood or semi -ripe and hardwood. Softwood cuttings, these are taken in late spring, can be tricky as the cutting material wilts very quickly and is often housed in mist units to stop this. Hardwood cuttings are the easiest, taken in winter it is nearly as easy as pushing a twig into the soil. Taking semi–hardwood cuttings is the most versatile method with nearly all woody trees, shrubs and climbers being suitable and successful for this methods of propagation and now is the time to do so.
Basic technics are as follows. Choose heathy non- flowering side shoots as your cuttings, place them in a plastic bag as you collect them to retain moisture or no harm to throw them into a bucket of water for the short time you are harvesting them. Your cuttings should be between 5 and 10 centimetres long after you cut them down to size. Do this by cutting just below a leaf node, this is where a leaf grows off a stem.
Strip off the cuttings lower leaves leaving typically 3 or 4 at the top of the cutting. This is to take the strain of the cutting material by lessening the transpiration, or water loss and this also to keep leaves out of the potting compost which may cause rot. You will never get 100% strike rate or at least assume this so take more cuttings than you need plants.
Dip your cutting base in a rooting hormone powder, this is not essential but should help increase you strike percentage and is also particularly effective with hard to propagate species. You can put your cuttings in ordinary garden soil but be vigilant with the weeds that grow. Ideally though a mix of compost and horticulutral grit 50/50 or use John Innes No.2 compost for better results.
Using a 10 centimetre pot filled with compost and push your cuttings at 3 to 4 per pot around the edge to about half their depth, water and place in a sheltered light but not too sunny place.. Try to avoid the leaves of the cuttings from touching. You can rig up a little propagating unit over the pot by using a clear plastic sandwich or food storage bag set on some short bamboo canes. Cut a small breather hole in the top of the plastic bags to stop the cuttings sweating and rotting.
Keep a regular check for powdery mildew and other fungal diseases. Don’t be tempted to have a little tug to see if your cuttings have rooted instead lift the pots carefully and examine the pots drainage holes for signs of roots after a couple of months. When you are sure you have well rooted cuttings, some time in October, gently seperate them from each other and pot on into individual pots for planting out next early summer.
Cost effectiveness is not the only reason that propagating is so useful to gardeners although for plants that are particularly expensive to buy it is a bonus. It can often be a way to get a plant that may be an old variety that is no longer grown commercially or a plant that you can’t identify to buy anyway. Never take cuttings from plants without permission.