Mid-Atlantic Gardening: Indoor gardening, Mid atlantic, 2015, 1 by Gitagal

Gitagal wrote:
Patience pays off.....

Don't remember when, exactly, I took this big leaf off of my BIG Mama
Beefsteak Begonia plant and decided to try, again, the leaf-propagation--
where you cut through the bigger veins on a big leaf, lay it over a tray
with about 1" of soil, take toothpicks and Cris-cross them over each cut
to hold the cut in contact with the soil and keep the soil moist..
I also stuck the end of the leaf stem into the soil to nurture the future development
of any new platelets sprouting. put the tray on the bottom shelf of my
light set-up, that sits right above a heat vent.
The shallower, lidded produce trays or bakery trays work great, as they are vented.

Then I waited....and waited....and waited....:o..........:o[.........:o?

1--The first baby to shoot up was from the buried stem. That's good to remember!

2--It seemed big enough for me to remove it and give it it's own pot.
it had quite a root system to it! It is now growing on my LR windowsill.

3--Some time passed. I basically ignored this tray. The leaf was starting
to look ragged, as I kept messing with it to keep all the cuts touching the soil,
moving the toothpicks around, etc.
BUT--two weeks ago--I saw 4 new sprouts coming up. YEAHHH!!!
Gonna let them grow a lot more before I detach them and pot them up.

4--This Beafsteak Begonia is an older progeny of the MAMA plant.
Maybe second year? Third??

5--Here is the HUGE Mama plant. It has grown very well since I brought it inside.

What they usually do outside is grow all these HUGE leaves-some are 6" across.
When I bring the plant inside for the winter, some of the big leaves start to yellow
out and I have to pull them off. Lets face it--inside a warm room, with limited light
and no humidity--the big leaves just cannot sustain themselves.

SOOOO!!! I had an idea!!! I will cut off a couple more of these huge leaves and
do more leaf propagation. A fun way to get new plants. And growing new plants
like this produces much nicer plants than if I just rooted a cut off leaf stem in water.
You get a complete little, plant by the leaf-propagation method. :)

Gita