Why Do Cuttings Fail? Propagation Tips

Hi again it's Jason from Fraser Valley Rose farm  and i have to say without any false modesty that   i've gotten fairly good now at propagating plants  from cuttings this wouldn't be much of a business   without it substantially now everything in my  greenhouse here all of the stuff behind you   all the stuff on the floor elsewhere in the  greenhouse is all propagated from cuttings   and i actually make a pretty reasonable  income selling the resulting plants so   this wasn't always the case i have to be up  front early on i struggled an awful lot with   it and although the topic may have been how  do i succeed in growing plants from cuttings   really the question i was asking was : Why do  I keep on failing? when you see the plants dry   out when you see the plants begin rotting from  the base up that black stem coming up from the   base of the soil you wonder what did i do wrong  i'm going to break those failures up into three   basic categories number one is choosing the wrong  plant or the wrong stage of growth so it all comes   down to the source of the plant number two comes  down to technique how do you make that cutting   and number three it comes down to the  growing environment and all three are   equally important in deciding whether your  plant will dry out whether it will rot   or whether it will root and shoot in that order  and make a successful cutting let's have a look at   some of the failures and then we'll work forward  to some of the successful ways of doing this   so i have two cuttings here and the first one you  can see is still quite firm and plump and green   with those red buds on it so it's it's actually  holding moisture quite nicely but as i move   downwards you can also see that from the base is  that telltale black rot that's moving up the stem   and a little further up here you can see that  thorn on the right hand side is starting to   darken around that it's just working its  way up the stem it will kill the entire   cutting ultimately move over to the right here you  can see that basically the opposite is true the   stem is plump and green at the base it even has  some leaves emerging from that bud on the right   so i have every reason to believe that it's  developing roots down below the surface however   up above at some point or another  it just wasn't enough moisture   to maintain that section of stem up to the next  node so the plant died back in that section   now early on you can definitely take some clues  from the way that you're cutting fails typically   if it's rotting you would interpret that as  too moist too much humidity too still of air   and maybe not enough temperature that might be  the way you would interpret it depending on how   your setup is if you look over to the right there  and if it dries out you might interpret that as   too little moisture too much air movement and  too much temperature so if you're balancing out   your your growing conditions that might be the way  you interpret it but it is important not to read   too much into that because ultimately if your  cuttings are going to fail it's going to be in   one of these two modes either it will dry out  before it rots or it will rot before it dries   out but it's going to do one of those two things  if it's not going to succeed with developing roots   and then shooting after that so then it begs the  question what are the conditions that make it most   likely that your plant will succeed in rooting  quickly before it suffers one of these two fates   let's get right down to the root causes here cause  number one why your cuttings may fail is you're   choosing to take cuttings of a very difficult  variety or you're taking cuttings of a variety   that root would root better by a different  method than the one you're using and how   would you know you could go on forever trying to  root a particular rose or a particular hydrangea   from softwood or semi-hardwood or hardwood  cuttings only not to know that it roots very   easily from a different kind of cutting for  most of the macrophylla hydrangeas i find   they take fairly easily from most stages but this  year i found they take much much better from tip   cuttings than they ever do from semi-hardwood  cuttings who knew i didn't until i tried it so   here's the way you could approach that you could  say let's do it the hard way you know and you   could start from a to z abelia to zizyphus and  try every stage of cutting and every kind of plant   and really try out everything or you could do  it the easier way because let's face it the   propagation community has tried all of this  before and generally they're very willing to   share that information if you go on to the culture  guides for most of the major horticulture industry   partners like ball or um walters they will give  you culture guides that talk about the specifics   of temperature of humidity of time in the tray and  everything to make your cuttings or on the amateur   end a wealth of information go to your facebook  groups uh those places like um uh the probably   the best one right now i find is uh i love  plant propagation which is mike kincaid's group   on facebook and the people there are wonderful  about sharing their propagation information   because let's face it we're all geeks in this  regard we all love trying new things and sharing   our successes and maybe even our failures so  that's where you should start don't don't spend   a lot of time on a plant uh with just one method  and keep on failing and never think to well am i   using the wrong method am i picking things up  at the wrong time of year i can give you some   specific directions or tips on this and number  one is that when in doubt i usually start with   semi-hardwood i find that method to be adaptable  along a wide range of perennials and shrubs   there may be things that take a little bit better  from soft softwood cuttings but even if you can   get it from soft food cuttings you can usually get  it from semi-hardwood as well the second specific   tip i'll give you on this is that in general  the the better the condition the more robust   both the plant and the section of the plant you  take the cutting from the more likely it is to   succeed so if you're taking it from a very healthy  plant and a very healthy section of a very healthy   plant you give yourself the very best chance  second set of big reasons that could have to   do with your success or failure comes down to the  cutting technique itself and although there are   plenty of videos out there including my own where  you can go and look up specific cutting techniques   for different plants here i just want to focus  in on a few of the differences in technique   that i think can make a big difference  to your success or failure so number one   start with a clean sharp pair of pruners clean  and sharp because you don't want to be introducing   any bacteria or fungus that will then turn into  rot organisms on your cutting and you also want a   clean cut because if you crush the bottom of that  stem it's going to very much reduce your chances   of success in terms of what to clean it with i  used to say something more complicated but simpler   is probably better lysol is readily available  not too expensive and it won't rust your pruners   second thing that i will highlight is make sure  that you take your cutting just below the node the   node is the place where the leaf comes out i'll  show you i'll insert a clip here but the further   you go from that node the further you are away  from the tissue that can differentiate and create   the callus at the bottom of your cutting even a  quarter of an inch can make a big difference in   success or failure so definitely target that and  the third thing i'm going to highlight here is the   use of rooting hormone which is in general for  a soft wood cutting or something in very active   growth it's a low level of rooting hormone and  for things that are in dormancy is a higher level   of rooting hormone but follow the directions  because it can vary from variety to variety   i use it it increases my success rate as i take  my cutting some people try to substitute it with   things like honey or cinnamon or bananas  or apple cider vinegar or other things   like that and although i can't say in every single  case that i've tested these the ones that i've   tried have not been that successful and there  is very little objective or reviewed evidence   that supports their use in the way that uh that  rooting hormones themselves based on iba will   improve your success rate so if you're looking for  an edge that's one place where you can get it the   final area i'm going to cover in this video comes  down to the growing environment of your cuttings   and really it comes down to controlling four  variables once you've stuck those cuttings   you're controlling light you're controlling  temperature you're controlling humidity and   you're controlling soil moisture and it varies  a lot depending on what stage your cuttings   are taking so if you're taking something in  active growth a soft wood or a tip cutting   typically the higher the temperature the higher  the light level the higher the moisture the soil   moisture the higher the humidity you're cutting  will accept or even possibly need for it to root   quickly and to get through to the next stage if  you're going to semi-hardwood cuttings choose   something in the middle for all of those things  and for hardwood cuttings you're generally going   to want lower temperatures lower light levels  less humidity held around the plant and less soil   moisture so those are your general variables  and you're going to have to play with them a   little bit to see what is most successful for you  based on the feedback from your cuttings as i said   earlier if you notice that a lot of your plants  are drying out that is wilting or shriveling from   the top then you may have to push your environment  a little more towards the the wetter whereas if   you're finding that they are rotting from the  base up consistently that probably means you're   going to have to push the other way out to a  slightly drier a little more air circulation and   and trying to cut down or sorry increase the  heat a little bit so that it doesn't rot uh so   quickly so these are your these are your growing  environment considerations i definitely go through   that in a number of my other videos but i'll  just leave it right there for now as to say   these are the common causes why your cuttings  will fail if you have any questions drop those   down below the video and i'll see what i can do  to help and thank you so much for watching today

Channel: Fraser Valley Rose Farm

Views: 344,609

Rating: 4.910882 out of 5

Keywords: why cuttings fail, why propagation fails, why cuttings die, why cuttings rot, why cuttings turn black, plant propagation, propagation tips, propagation by cuttings

Id: fkL-KHQvk8Y

Length: 10min 37sec (637 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 13 2020