some questions...

1) I have had some jasmine cuttings that I got a back in early June. They have been in water and doing great I took a couple out and potted them up. The quickly died. Today I took the other 2 cuttings and put them in my bubbler. Think this will work?
2) I took some Crape Myrtle cuttings today. I took long stems and cut them in 2,3 or 4 places. I dipped them in rooting hormone. I made a bed of sand 3-4 inches deep and put them in this. I cut the tops off that had the buds and flowers on them. The center cuts should do fine shouldn't they?
3) How long does rooting hormone last?
thanks for your time
dawn

I think both jasmine and crape myrtle are easy to root in potting soil, sand or other medium. I tried my fish tank for crape myrtle, over the air stone, with no success so I went back to vermiculite. Someone said that bubblers are for softwood cuttings from plants that would normally root in water- bubbling just speeds it up. I'm trying to bubble root the stem of a white coneflower right now- the guppies don't seem to mind but I would be careful not to use poisonous plants like oleander. Anyhow, this time of year is good to root crape myrtle (or jasmine, I think). My last crape myrtle cuttings, from July, have already rooted and are putting out growth. I guess I'd better pot or plant soon.

I tried to root CM in April or May with less success- maybe 25%. The last (July) batch was about 75% successful. I just put 'em in a vermiculite pot, with root hormone or without - I forget, in the shade and try to remember to water almost every day. I use the almost white plastic pots from Lowe's so I can write on it what the plant is with a Sharpie.

The main thing about rooting these plants is that they are mostly successful no matter what I do unless I let them dry out. BTW, figs are like that too but even easier.

Good luck,
Paul

I have better success rooting directly into soil for most things. If I root in water first, the roots tend to be very fine, and don't survive moving into soil very well. I did seven cuttings of Jasmine sambac last month, and six of them have rooted already. The seventh looks to be a goner, but I'm going to give it a few more days.

I ususally use rooting hormone, except for things like coleus that don't need it.

Thanks! Mine aren't doing much. I think I am going to take some more CM's and try again. This time I'm going to put them where they get even less sun. They do not get direct sun but even in the GH I think they may have gotten too much sun. I may have let them get too dry too. They were doing really well. I did not ck on them Sat and Sunday when I looked at them the leaves were wilted. Think I've lost them? I watered them.

Update on the jasmine - I have little green nodes on one cutting left. Out of 3 that I had. It takes a while I guess for them to get going. Out of all the CM cuttings I've taken I have 2 that have new growth on them. Learing in progress here.

I have a very small pkg of the rooting harmone and I don't know how to use it !! Could some one help me out with it. Do I mix it up with some water or what. It is powder form.

flower, you just dip the cuttings in the powder.

try to guess how much powder you will need, put that amount on a clean piece of paper or in a small cup and dip your cuttings. throw away left-overs when done, do not put back into the container with the clean powder.

OK !!!!!! I bought it and didn't get instuctions with it so I hated to venture to try it as I just didn't know what to do with it. LOL I have never used it before but wanted to try it.

Hummm- I don't know if the instructions came with mine or not - it's been years since I used it. I just wet the end of the cutting and stuck that in the jar - tapped the dusted end off in the jar and planted it. It was too expensive to throw away the excess.

Well I ventured to use it on some suculents that someone sent me to tryout and so far they are doing great and am glad of that WOOHOO

G'Day Folks
Assuming the rooting hormone is IBA in the ready mixed powder form it has a limited life of about 12 months or a bit more if kept tightly sealed. The crystaline form (pure) that has to be dissolved with alcohol then diluted with water will keep for about the same time if kept in the fridge, the unmixed crystals much longer.
You also need to check that you have the right strength for the cuttings you are striking because if you use the hardwood mix on soft cuttings you will kill the cutting. I would assume that you have the same classification as us and that is Powder no.1 softwood, no 2 medium and no 3 hardwood cuttings.
I found that even easy to strike cuttings did so faster and with more roots if the rooting hormone was used.
Photo is of grafted vine cuttings being prepared for planting out after 10 days in a hot room at 27c after using liquid IBA.
Regards

Hummmmmmm - don't understand this photo at all, it looks like the rooting powder is on the top and the roots are on the other end. Am I seeing things???

I really enjoy rooting cuttings (or trying to) and have been experimenting for several years. Have done a lot of reading and researching and have had really good luck for the last year. First of all, I mix rootone (rooting hormone) and honey (1 part (ex.1 tsp) rootone to 3 parts (ex 3 tsp) honey.) in a container that has a lid (so you can reuse). Take a 3" to 6" cutting, and remove all but the top 3 or 4 leaves and any flowers. If leaves are very large can cut them in half. With a knife or sharp object scar the cutting below a leaf node (where a leaf grew)(I don't always do this and still have good luck) Next get a container such as a coffee can and fill with perlite. Now dip the cutting into the honey mix coating well and then stick it down into the perlite. The perlite with stick to the cutting. I do enough cuttings to fill the container. Next I use a large knife and make a wide opening in sand in the ground and carefully place the cuttings in a row. When the row is full, skip over about half an inch and stick the knife in the ground and press the sand up next to the cuttings. I skip over another inch and make another long slit and plant more cuttings. This works really well, but if you want to improve your success rate, work with the moon signs. (I use the Gardening by the Moon calendar) . I have found the sign Capricorn to give me close to100% rooted cuttings followed by Scorpio, Pisces, and Taurus. Contrary to this, I did an experiment with African Violets for about 6 months putting a cutting on with each moon change and Gemini proved to be the best. Begonias root best if done after the moon becomes full. Hope this helps someone. Happy rooting, Kay

G'Day
Sorry for confusing you Azalea but I did state that the cuttings had been treated with liquid IBA, which is colourless, only the bottom half inch is dipped in the IBA. What you can see at the top is where the graft has been dipped in hot wax to protect it from dessication when planted out in field. The solid white is callus around the graft and over the top of that is wax which covers from the top to about an inch below the graft. The photo is of one of our lady workers getting ready to dip the rooted graftlings into the wax, note that the roots are up and the grafted piece pointing down.
Regards

You must be replacing a whole vineyard to be doing that many grafted grapes. Or do youi sell them once they start growing?

G'Day
I managed a nursery that produced Vines and Trees for commercial growers and during the vine planting boom of the 1990s we grew just over a million "Own rooted" and 100,000 grafted vines per year as well as our fruit trees which amounted to about 50,000. The term "Own rooted" is used for the cuttings that produce their own roots, the same as cuttings you grow at home. From 2000 the demand for vines declined and last year we only grew about 50,000 Own rooted and 30,000 grafted vines. Photo is of the vine patch with digging in progress, the bare ground had been dug prior to the photo being taken, with a lot more to go. Each row has about 4,000 rootlings in it. The vines are "Dug" with a special machine that lifts the young rootlings out of the soil, shakes them so that most of the dirt falls off then ties them into bundles ready for transport to the packing sheds. I must tell you that we were only a medium sized nursery some were handling up to 5 million per year.
Regards