WHAT IS A “CUTTING”?
BY GLADYS JEURINK
We hear people
use this word often when talking about new plants. Our grandmothers
received most of her plants this way as friends traded. Patented plants
can not be legally gotten this way. Aside from seeds this is our major
reproduction method and there are different types such as stem, root, or
leaves. Many of the plants we buy in the store are stem cuttings. Stems
produce roots directly.
Stem cuttings
can be softwood, semi-ripe or hard wood. Softwood cuttings are a piece
(usually a tip) of a young well developed branch, without a flower or
bud to give the new to be roots all the energy they can get. I like to
cut just below a leaf and then take the leaf off as its area will be in
the soil. Rooting hormones
are easy to find in the garden centers. Roots can be started in many
plants in water but when you lift them out they all flop together if you
are not careful. Prepare your pots ahead with damp potting soil, dip the
bare stem tips (3 to 5 inches) in rooting hormone. It is generally a
white powder. To keep from knocking the hormone off I use a pencil to
make a hole in the soil and gently put the stem in the hole, gently put
the soil in close, then water enough to help soil close in on the stem.
If it is a
single stem or a very precious one, you can help it along by inverting a
jar over the plant to keep the humidity high and then just wait for the
roots to develop. Leave only a few leaves on your cutting so the new
roots can supply them with water.
Copyright 2016
TRYING FOR A
BY GLADYS JEURINK
One of my WATER
LILY ponds has developed a slow leak and I have been wanting a “bog
garden”! B.J. put the contents of the compost pile into the water that
was left. By definition a bog is an area of soil that is water logged.
I grew up in
B.J. went plant
hunting to see what else was available. He found a bog WATER LILY with
red leaves in a clump about 18 inches across. So far no blooms. The
tallest plant he found is the CYPERUS. This summer it was over 7 feet
all with many huge flowering heads that are in a whorl of 10
to 15 bracts about 2 feet across. This is the plant from which
the first paper was developed-Papyrus.
CALTHA, or
MARSH MARIGOLD, or KINGS CUP is a spreading, short (about 12 inches)
plant with yellow blooms. It is listed as hardy in zones 3-7. Several of
my others are not hardy here in
HORSETAIL
(Equisetum) is a jointed stem plant we used to make into necklaces as it
can be pulled apart at any of the joints and put back in place. In the
bog in |