Lawn Care - Lawn Care Maintenance Tips

Vegetative Propagation- Buddleia Cutting

August 31st, 2007 Subscribe To Our Feed

Propagating new plants from existing ones is not only utterly economical, it is also one of the most satisfying aspects of gardening.

Once you are able to strike your own cuttings you move up from just being a “check book gardener”- whereby you buy all your plants to a proper gardener.

The particular shrub I am featuring here is a Buddleia. This is a wonderful shrub, which is awesome for attracting bees and butterflies. It has a distinctive scent of honey and comes in various colors, including pink, purple and a wonderful version with white petals and a gold center.

There are two important aspects of taking successful cuttings:

* The choice of stock. As your plants will be clones of the parent plant, you should only select vigorous specimens, which are producing the flower color you want. Taking cuttings at the right time is also important. Do this when the plant is growing well, and select a shoot which is neither too sappy and young, nor too woody and old.

* Correct aftercare. With very few exceptions, most cuttings fail because of lack of attention. Think of your cuttings as patients in hospital that have just undergone some trauma. Keep them warm and in a suitably moist — but not wet — atmosphere to prevent transpiration.

You can view the video of the cutting here.

You must be on guard for transpiration (loss of moisture) the minute you sever the cutting from the master plant.From that moment, until it creates its own roots, all it has to live on is the moisture within it. So, immediately slip it into a polythene bag into which you have introduced some plain water (either by spraying or simply putting a spoonful of water in the bottom). Close the neck of the bag tightly and put it well out of the way of the sun’s rays.

As soon as possible, process the cutting, as shown on the video. It’s very important to be very hygienic about taking cuttings, using only clean pots and fresh compost and making the final cut on the plant a clean one with a very sharp tool, such as a craft knife or scalpel.

The original cut, when you sever the cutting from the plant can be made with secateurs and can be between leaf junctions. But the final, sharp cut should be just below a leaf joint, leaving a cutting about 3 1/2″ (8cm) long. Strip off the bottom leaves, making sure there is no odd bits left, which could rot and cause disease later.

Dip the cut end in hormone rooting power and insert into a hole in a pre-watered compost, consisting of half compost and half vermiculite, perlite (a type of porous white rock) or agricultural fine sand. I find dribbling a little fine sand in the hole helps rooting.

Then comes the important bit: keeping the cutting moist until it can fend for itself. First spray the leaves with clean water. There’s no need to water the compost as that should have already been done before you inserted the cutting. Doing it now will only wash off the hormone rooting powder.

Then carefully enclose the pot and cutting in a polythene bag with the top closed. Place the pot somewhere warm, but not too hot or in direct sunlight.

Once you see fresh growth and vigor in the cutting, that’s a sure sign you have roots. Once that is apparent, gradually open the mouth of the bag a little more every couple of days. After a week or so you can take the bag off as the plant will now be self supporting and be able to find its own moisture through its new roots.

You can now start to feed with a weak mix of seaweed or other organic fertilizer. Making the mix too strong, at this stage, would be like giving gin to a baby! Later on, you can pot the plant into a bigger pot and - later still — plant it out into the garden.

And, if you find you have taken too many cuttings, you are bound to find another skilled cutting taker with whom you can swap plants, thus increasing the range of plants in your garden and making new friends on the way!

For more information on how to grow flowers and create special arrangements, check out Cutting Gardens.