Pics o ho.

Oh, you are good! Me? I infrequently take cuttings of common annuals to root in water, then almost always forget about them.

Yes, they die... I'm hopeless.

I've got chrysanthemums rooting in the aftermath of a Chelsea chop. They're ridiculously easy to root and equally easy to give away.

I need to root some rose cuttings, specifically Skyrocket. I've been putting it off because of the heat, but have it on my to-do list for tomorrow. Maybe I'll also do a Seafoam or two while I'm at it.

I've got very little space to plant anything else but I do take cuttings sporadically. Many of mine are reminders of travels and people. I've got a couple of roses, Buff Beauty from my Dad and Cécile Brunner from a hedge on Eel Pie Island. A Hebe, Nicola's Blush, daughter of one which grew too big, currants and gooseberries on the allotment, Jasmine from a French farmhouse holiday, Trachelospermums and a fig from FIL, a winter honeysuckle from Dad's old neighbour not to mention almost all my house plants. My jades come from outside DDs in-laws flat in Rome. And I did 3 dozen lavenders for DDs wedding which then didn't happen because of COVID.

Has anyone got any tips, then? I have usually done super easy hardwood cuttings, literally just stuck in the ground and watered sporadically...and softwood tips from my mother plants. Also, salvias and penstemon as they are practically guaranteed to succeed. Lavenders and Dianthus have been very iffy. Timings, I think might be an issue. Also clematis have been tricky. Anyways, starting slowly with more salvia, nepetas, teucrium and oregano...but very keen to do lavender, although I might have missed the boat.

I take cuttings of Agastgache 'Blue Blazes', probably my favorite plant, every spring. It tends to be a short lived perennial and I don't want to be without. I generally take 3 cuttings and usually 2 make it. This year I also took cuttings of A. 'Blue Fortune', took 3 but only 1 made it.

I don't remember when I did the lavender but it was probably June. And I used short pieces, both new and old wood, ca. 5cm. Just put them in modules of compost on a table in the garden. They rooted very fast.

Mmm, going to have a try if I can find any shoots which are not flowering. Did you cover them, floral?

I had a disaster with wind wrecking Phyllis Fancy salvia...so lots of cutting material.

No I didn't cover them.

I recently tried out the plastic tote
method, using wet sand and bark as the medium, and putting the cover in & leaving it for 6 weeks. 2/ 4 buttonbush cuttings rooted well & I’ve just potted them up. Spirea cuttings( Spirea “ Ogon”, which is hard to find) all failed, though the parent is one I propagated by soil- layering several years ago.
Will try next with some less common boxwoods & maybe hydrangeas.

Well.... I've attempted. Trying to think back now if I ever had any success. Nothing comes to mind lol.

At the moment I've got some rose cuttings dying on the patio. I've tried rose cuttings in the past but never had luck with them either. I do have a small surviving rose in a pot out there but I honestly can't remember if it was a cutting or a sucker I dug up and potted.

My strongest, most-serious attempt, and my biggest loss, was with an old rhododendron that was planted in front of my house in a foundation bed. After waffling for almost 25 years (because it was so beautiful) - not to mention whacking it back for almost 25 years - I finally decided to remove the rhodie. Wrong plant in wrong spot. Planted two feet from the foundation, and towered above the roofline of my cape. But I adored the blooms - a beautiful soft pink, unlike the more usual garish colors you see on so many rhodies. I tried for two or three years, several times throughout each year, and using different methods, to take and root cuttings, and just never had success. I am still so disappointed that none of those cuttings took.

About three days ago I was driving home and drove past an old farmhouse down the street. I have driven and walked by this old house for 30 years. This time, I noticed not one but TWO rose bushes blooming along the road frontage. I couldn't - still can't - imagine how I never noticed them! The farmer died at a ripe old age about 5 years ago, and luckily his lovely property was purchased by another local farmer. The house has been cleared out (and we're guessing will likely be torn down) but I wonder if the difference is that the electric company last year and the year before, came through and decimated the tree-lined canopy of the road, cutting down innumerable trees, all in the name of clearing the wires. While there are no wires in front of the farmhouse, trees across the street (where the wires are) were removed, allowing more sunlight onto the farmhouse's road frontage. Could the added light be the reason I now see roses in bloom?

Anyway, my first thought was that I am going to walk down there this weekend and take cuttings from both of the roses (one a lighter pink and one a darker pink). I'm going to read up a bit, maybe try a few different methods to hopefully promote some success. I am inspired by the stories I have read of roses being saved from old homesteads in the south and midwest. I guess a small, five-or-so-acre farm in southern New England 50 miles from NYC is not quite as romantic as some huge old windswept ranch in Texas, and for all I know these roses are just some old 1950's J&P body bag roses lol, but I like the idea of saving a bit of that farm, especially because who knows how long that land will remain farmland? Every spare bit of land around here is being built on, and I live in the part of my town where traditionally all the farms were - which means we have more land but it is disappearing so fast. So I hope I can save a bit of this old farm - someone who lived and worked there planted these roses, nurtured them, and enjoyed them, and I'd like to see them live on. Which means anyone but me should be trying to save them haha! No but seriously, I'll give it my best shot! I'll be watching this thread for any advice which I can use too.

:)

Dee

I do a fair few rose cuttings cos I am trying to grow mine on their own roots. Although I have had some success with semi ripe cuttings and polythene cloches, the easiest and most reliable has been pencil thick hardwood cuttings,taken in November or thereabouts. Very simple,requiring almost zero effort other than keeping the soil ( I use 5litre pots with basic topsoil ) from drying out. Takes a long time, all winter and spring but has been almost guaranteed to succeed with just some late spring irrigation.

I've only taken cuttings from annual flowers (what we grow as summer flowers here) -- salvia, heliotrope, etc. I use rooting hormone and stick them in moistened potting mix in plug trays, enclose them in a clear plastic bag or under humidity dome. The salvia roots much faster and more robustly from the initial round of cuttings in the fall in a sunny window (for the indoor mother plants) than they do over the winter under the lights -- pretty much guaranteed to root in the fall, but ~50% failure rate over winter. Heliotrope or geraniums (Pelargonium) don't seem to care either way. I've also found that sticking the cutting straight into the medium works better than make a small hole with a pencil or chopstick first and then tamping the media around them, probably because just jamming it in there straight down ensure contact with the media. No special tips other than that. Some years it comes easy, other years it doesn't....