My free plants. They may not look like much now, but wait until next summer!
Back in September, some friends of mine generously let me raid their gardens. In addition to digging up some extra plants for me, they gave me several cuttings from their hydrangeas, gardenias, and pelargonium.
The last time I had tried rooting cuttings was almost 10 years ago in my plant propagation class, and we had a professional greenhouse. In a professional setting, they use a specially-formulated, sterilized
potting mix and a mist system to keep the plants moist, and the air
humid. I have a book somewhere that tells me the ideal cutting length,
how many leaves to remove, and the best month of the year to take
cuttings. I didn't pay attention to any of that this time. What I did have was some leftover Dip n' Grow that they gave us in class, some leftover potting soil, a spot in my house with plenty of bright, indirect light, and a spray bottle.
The hydrangeas got the most attention. I stuck them in Dip n' Grow, removed some of the leaves (it cuts down on moisture loss for the cuttings), and stuck them in the old potting mix I had on hand. The saddest-looking one I stuck in water because it looked too dried-out to make it otherwise (they got a little crispy because I left them in the hot sun immediately after cutting them--I was in a hurry). After that, I sprayed them all generously twice a day with my spray bottle. I stuck the gardenias, pelargonium, and some rosemary and sage cuttings (from plants I had at home) in straight water, no dip n' grow.
The results were actually a little better than I was expecting. Six weeks later, both rosemary cuttings, 1 of the pelargonium cuttings, and 2 of the hydrangea had rooted. The hydrangea cuttings that made it were actually the one in water, and one in potting mix that lost all its leaves early on. The sage died, and the others probably won't take root at this point, but I consider it a win considering I didn't put that much money or effort into it. I took the cuttings that had rooted and re-planted them into some new Miracle-Gro potting mix to give them an extra boost, and stuck them in a sheltered spot behind my house that gets partial sun (as you see in the picture at the top of this post). They probably won't do much in this cold weather, but they will get good and acclimated and ready to grow like crazy next spring.
The moral of the story is that, with a little patience, it's easy to stretch your gardening budget with cuttings. Just buy some Dip n' Grow--it's worth every penny.
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