African Violets and Gesneriads: Need help for rooting leaves, 1 by critterologist

critterologist wrote:
now that I've gotten that off my chest, LOL....

I think cutting the stems at an angle is supposed to increase the number of plantlets coming from the leaf. You'll see plantlets sooner if less stem is buried (I think simply because they take longer to reach the surface of the soil mix if they are coming from a stem end that's an inch or more down), but any way you cut the stem you'll get babies.

I read something a while back that I've been trying, and I think I do get more plantlets faster by this method.... In addition to cutting the stem at an angle, I scrape my fingernail gently along the front of the stem, just enough that I see a little "wet" where I've removed the outer "skin" of the stem a little. I think of this as essentially making an very long, shallowly angled cut... and plantlets do seem to develop from all along the scraped part.

When I scrape the stem like that, I may also leave the stem longer than I would otherwise. I pot the leaf with the stem at an angle, so that the scraped front of the stem faces upwards and is fairly close to the soil surface. The trick here is not to end up with the leaf itself lying on the moist potting mix, as that can lead to rot.

I also use a suggestion from Rob and others and cut off at least the very tip of the leaf, which keeps the leaf itself from growing larger and lets it put all its energy into rooting and making babies.

With a large leaf, I may do significantly more trimming just so it fits better in the propagation tray.

Smaller leaves do really well for me in plastic take-out containers, with holes for bottom watering and holes in the top for ventilation. Here's what one of my containers of mini leaves looks like newly planted: