1. Temperature – try to keep the propagator temperature above 64°F (18°C,) but don’t let it exceed 75°F (24C°).
2. Humidity – keep the vents on your propagator closed to keep the humidity above 90%. Once the cuttings have produced roots open the vents to lower humidity and encourage transpiration.
3. Water – over saturated growing media [...]
The most successful and productive indoor gardeners all have one thing in common—they love cuttings! Talk to any serious grower and you’ll hear the same story. Consistently high quality and regular crops depend on a steady flow of healthy, vigorous cuttings. So it makes sense to give cuttings the best start in life possible. Too often when we visit indoor gardens we find trays of neglected cuttings, just managing to survive, relegated to a shelf in a dusty corner of the veg room. That just ain’t right! Merely keeping cuttings alive is not the aim of the game. Think of it like this … if we cause our new recruits undue stress when they are still young, fresh and fragile, it’s the botanical equivalent of dropping our babies down the stairs! Ouch! Even if they survive, they could be traumatized for the rest of their lives!
Seasoned indoor gardener Curtis raves about General Hydroponics’ Rapid Rooters and explains why he’s such a fan.
Everest takes a look at keeping a healthy mother plant and why she’s worthy of a lot more time, care and investment than many growers appear to realize.
Tissue culture combines mother plants, cloning, and rooting in a single system that’s 10 to 100 times as efficient as ordinary cloning. Tissue culture growers can produce thousands of clones a month, or as few as they wish, from the multiplying and rooting of plants in jars. There are only a few basic steps.
Every experienced grower loves to take cuttings to generate more plants with the same characteristics. And, of course, there’s no better gift you can give to any fellow grower than good genetics. But are all cuttings really equal? And can you take a cutting from a cutting from a cutting forever? Jeff Winterborne reveals all!
In this first part of our guide, veteran hydroponicist Everest Fernandez shares some of his personal, tried and tested techniques for taking top quality cuttings.
© 2010 Urban Garden Magazine