My experiment with "cuttings" (and a question or three)

When I trimmed a mature hedge in the front garden in the summer of 2011, I stuck a small piece of it in a pot: 18 months on and this is what I have now. (In the front of that pot are two pieces I stuck in last Autumn)



And here is my other pot of cuttings: 3 types of hebe, a piece of rosa rugosa, and a piece of holly (taken from the massive and very fast growing holly that is in my front garden but never berries).



As a beginner, I'm quite chuffed with my cuttings experiments!

Now the questions:

- should I leave them as they are for another year (or, would their roots get all mixed up and make it difficult to seperate them)?

- should I put each individual cutting into its own pot and leave them to mature a bit longer?

- should I plant them out into the garden and not mess about with an inbetween stage?

Thanks in advance

 

I'd pot them up individually and give them another year to grow on Mum.

I think if you leave them together in the same pot they will compete for space and light, resulting in weak, rather leggy plants. Potting them up individually will produce bushier, stronger plants.

On the subject of your holly which doesn't berry, holly plants are either male or female, only the females produce berries so you probably have a male plant there.

 

Hmm, a male holly; you are probably right .... trouble is, I have two of them and that would mean they are both male! Not to worry, they are evergreen, they give a touch of privacy and cover a good amount of space (I'm looking on the bright side here )

Ok, so, individual pots and wait one more year

 

I'd go along with Trunky.
maybe wait until April before potting up though.

 

Nice little experiment Mum,
Ain't Mother Nature a superstar,
Lovely little thread,
Jenny

 

Brilliant mum
It does give you a garderning confidence boost when cuttings take,i try alsorts..like you im not that experienced x

 

I think this "taking cuttings " dimension is very undersold. In the midst of Summer, with a bit of thought, I think a load of perrenials will reproduce in this way. I uummm "acquired" a heel cutting of a plant I liked in the Battle Almonry garden last Summer which rooted quite readily. I have taken a few Salvia cuttings and Fuchsias too. I favour the use of a rooting powder but maybe that's unnecessary?
Jenny

 

Well done Mum .......I love taking cuttings from all manor of plants (perennials, trees and shrubs), I have rooted things that normally are propagated by seed just by way of experimenting as you have done. At the end of the day there's nothing to lose

 

I seem to recall that my mother used your technique for increasing her plants

I didn't even think about rooting powder

 

When I prune anything, I always end up pushing some in a pot ,as I hate the thought of throwing away something living.
Last year I cut down to a stump some badly placed Cottoneaster, I pushed some shoots round the edge of a pot, when I went to my friends in September she was talking of needing something to grow into a screen. I put the rooted cuttings into a plastic bag in my case, heeled them in when I got there and planted in position when area ready.
When I was there Christmas most are obviously growing, couple look a bit sad, but may shoot from bottom in Spring.
Never use rooting powder.

 

I put my soft cuttings straight outside in a sandy bed, under a closhe. Tried both with rooting powder and without and the powder definately bought on earlier roots. All my forsythia and box cuttings rooted and survived the move to soil but my holly didn't root and withered. Perhaps because it has larger leaves which dried it out? I don't know.


Sandy Nursery. Reddish Holly top left, fosythia are the longer plants above the centre, some trees at the back and the foreground is all box.


Box moved to its intended bed.

I'm also experimenting with hardwood cuttings, including trees. For some reason oak cuttings seem to take very easily. Willow I kept in water until it rooted: 75% of my willow cuttings survived the move to soil but it's too early to see if they'll take. I also had some larger pieces of box and I rooted them by standing them in a bucket of water for six weeks.

To be honest, next time I'll take much larger cuttings when I can and try to root them in water. I don't know what others think but it's a lot less fiddly that way although, supposedly, the smaller cuttings will grow faster once planted.

 

Willow naturally produces the hormone used in rooting powder, and is quite often planted (as is Poplar) for sticks of reasonable length just pushed into the ground in early Winter (supposedly planting them in this way in November has a higher success rate than later in the Winter). So Willow, at least, should give you a pretty good strike rate, and rooting other things in a solution made up including crushed willow should also help with rooting.

I use the prunings off my Dogwoods as pea-sticks in the veg patch, and quite a lot of those have usually rooted by the end of the summer.