Rooting from Cuttings

If you're like me, you don't have a lot of money to spend for expensive plants, this is a good article telling you how to do cuttings from plants without spending an enormous amount of money. I'm always having friends and family giving me cuttings of different plants, so I've really gotten into the rooting the cutting methods. Frank

First of all, consider the plant that you want to propagate. Is it an evergreen, or is it deciduous? (A deciduous plant loses it's leaves during the winter.)

When many people think of evergreens, they only think about plants like Pines, Spruce, Taxus, Junipers, and Arborvitae. They don't consider the broadleaf evergreens like Rhododendrons, Azaleas, Laurel, and many of the Euonymus varieties.

Any plant that retains it's leaves over the winter is an evergreen, and you have to make sure you put your plants in the right category as you consider which propagation technique to use for each plant.

The next important thing for you to consider is the time of the year are you trying to propagate your plant. The techniques vary from season to season, as does the "wood" of the plant you are trying to propagate.

For the most part, when you are trying to propagate a plant by taking a cutting from the plant, you should be making your cutting from the new growth of the plant, or at least the growth from the current season. In other words from the tips of the branches.

As you go through this series of articles on plant propagation you are going to see the terms; "hardwood cuttings", "softwood cuttings", and semi-hardwood cuttings". You might be asking; "What in the world do those terms mean?" Let me explain using a deciduous plant as an example. Something like Forsythia.

During the winter months all plants go dormant. The first really hard freeze of the fall or early winter forces the plants into dormancy, and in most cases they take a little rest, or nap for the remainder of the winter. It's their resting period.

When the plants wake up in the spring the do so with a renewed vigor and they start growing like crazy. Some make beautiful flowers, but they all start putting on new growth. This new growth is very pliable. Actually soft and tender. As the growing season progresses this new growth becomes more rigid and woody. By the end of the growing season this new growth is very rigid and quite hard.

You can actually take and root cuttings of many plants at different stages of the cycle I just described. But because the "wood", as it is known to professional growers, changes throughout the cycle, so must your propagation techniques.

Thus the terms, softwood cuttings, semi-hardwood cuttings, and hardwood cuttings. If you are taking cuttings in the late spring you are working with softwood cuttings. The cuttings you take are very soft and pliable. I say late spring because it's really difficult to work with the new growth that is extremely soft in the early spring.

You really should wait four to six weeks for this new growth to harden off a little before you try and propagate with it. The ideal time to propagate with softwood cuttings is when you can take a cutting and not have it droop over immediately. Like I mentioned earlier, this is usually four to six weeks after the plants start growing in the spring.

Softwood cuttings are actually quite easy to root, but they are also delicate and fail easily.

As the growing season goes on, the new growth becomes more and more rigid, and by mid summer the wood you use for cuttings would be considered semi-hardwood cuttings. Actually this is the time to start doing many of your evergreen cuttings, as they do not do well as softwood cuttings.

Then by late fall or early winter the wood becomes very hard and woody, and the cuttings you take then would be considered hardwood cuttings.
Softwood Cutting:
If you watch closely as a Burning Bush develop buds in the early spring, you will see how these little tiny buds quickly develop into new growth shoots, 6" to 8" in length. These new shoots develop very quickly, once the plant begins to grow in the spring. This new growth is very soft and pliable. As the growing season progresses, this new growth becomes harder and more rigid. By fall this new growth has hardened off to the point that it is almost brittle.
The only difference between a softwood cutting and a hardwood cutting is the time of year you take the cutting. Both are of the current seasons growth. It is always recommended that the cuttings you use are of the current years growth. If you go too deep into a plant to take your cuttings, you are likely to get into wood that is more than one year old. Using this older wood is almost certain to hamper your results.

Propagation of softwood cuttings is usually done at the end of May or the beginning of June depending on the climate you are in. Trying to do softwood cuttings prior to that is a waste of time because the wood is too soft and will wilt down very quickly. The ideal time to take softwood cuttings is just as the wood begins to harden off.
Softwood cuttings of many deciduous plants root very quickly and easily under the right conditions. Controlling the conditions is critical. Softwood cuttings are very delicate and can dehydrate very easily, especially under the summer sun. However, with the warm temperatures of June, and the tenderness of softwood cuttings, root development will occur very quickly, if you can keep the cuttings from dehydrating.

The absolute best way to root softwood cuttings is by sticking them in a bed of very course sand and watering them very lightly for just a few seconds, every five or ten minutes, for a period of two to six weeks. Of course this is impossible, unless you have an automatic watering system known as an intermittent mist system.
Preparing a softwood cutting is easy. Just clip a cutting about 4" in length from the parent plant. Take only tip cuttings. In other words, just take one cutting from each branch, the top four inches of each branch. This is the newest growth. Strip the leaves off the lower two thirds of the cutting, leaving just a stem and a few leaves at the top.

When propagating softwood cuttings, wounding the cutting slightly can help the rooting process. You can wound the cutting by scraping the side of the stem lightly from the bottom of the cutting up 1/2".

It is always beneficial to treat your cuttings with a liquid or a powder rooting compound just prior to sticking them. Rooting compounds are available at most garden centers and do help to stimulate root development. It really doesn't matter whether you use a liquid or a powder. There are different strengths available in the powder formulas. Hardwood cuttings require a stronger formula than softwood cuttings.

Most liquid rooting compounds are sold in concentrate form and must be diluted with water. I like the liquid because all you have to do is adjust the amount of water you add depending on whether you are propagating softwood or hardwood cuttings. There are instructions on the package.

The best growing medium for softwood cuttings is a very coarse grade of sand. You do not want to stick the cuttings in soil. The sand you use must be course. When you water the sand, the water should run right through. The sand should have very little moisture retention ability. The stems of softwood cuttings rot very easily.

Preparing an area to stick your cuttings is quite simple. For softwood cuttings all you need is a wooden or plastic flat, or a small raised bed. I recommend using flats for softwood cuttings, so you can start them in the shade and move them into the sun after a period of 7-10 days.

The flats should be 3-4" deep. Fill them to the top with course sand. Make your cuttings as described earlier, dip them in a rooting compound, and stick them in the flat. It helps to make a hole or a slice in the sand first, so the cutting will slide in easier. Softwood cuttings are not very rigid. They will break if you try and force them into the sand. Using a putty knife or a masonry trowel you can slice an opening through the sand, or use a large screw driver to make a hole in the sand. Space your cuttings about 1" apart in the flat. Firm the sand around the cuttings as you stick them, you do not want air pockets around the stems. You can also water thoroughly the first time to make sure all of the voids are filled.

It is said that the ideal time to take softwood cuttings is early in the morning. However, that is not always convenient for me, so I have taken them at all hours of the day. I have never been able to determine whether or not morning, noon, or night yielded the best results.

Softwood cuttings wilt very quickly. Take just a few cuttings at a time and get them stuck in the sand and watered as quickly as possible. When you first take the cuttings, keep them in the shade for a period of 7-10 days. This gives them a chance to harden off before you put them in the sun. Plants need at least partial sun in order to develop roots.

Water them lightly, as often as you can, especially the first few days. Proper watering is critical. The ideal situation is to apply a very light spray of water for just a few seconds, allow that water to evaporate off almost completely, and then water again. Of course this is next to impossible without automatic equipment, but if you can at least water lightly every couple of hours the first day or so, you should realize some degree of success.
If your first batch of softwood cuttings do poorly, try a new batch as soon as you realize your first batch is failing. Just a few days can make a remarkable difference in the texture of the wood as the new growth matures. Cuttings that wilt down almost immediately one day might do 100% better two days later. As the new growth matures, the wood hardens off, and the cuttings become more durable. Of course the harder wood takes a little longer to establish roots.

Softwood cuttings are delicate and somewhat difficult, but if you can keep them from wilting they will root very quickly. Propagating with hardwood cuttings are much easier, but it takes considerably longer to establish roots on hardwood cuttings. Also, there are some plants that are difficult to root using the hardwood method.

If you are an avid gardener, you might consider setting up an intermittent mist system in your backyard. The amount of space required is very small, but there is an investment in the equipment. Maybe a friend or neighbor is also an avid gardener and would like to go together with you to share the cost of an intermittent mist system. Intermittent mist makes rooting softwood cuttings like child's play. As a matter of fact, when my youngest son was in the first grade, he took softwood cuttings, stripped the cuttings, dipped them in the rooting compound, and stuck them in the sand. That’s all there is to it, the intermittent mist system does the rest.
This is taken from Michael J. McGroarty's website at http://www.freeplants.com/-It's very good information on rooting cuttings. This year I'm buying a "bottom heater, which decreases the amount of time you spend waiting on cuttings to root, plus, they can be done in winter.
Here's the links: http://www.freeplants.com/plant-propagation-the-basics.htm
I'll post about bottom heaters in my next blog. My thanks to Mike for a very informative article!