Reproducing Plants From Hardwood Cuttings

Reproducing Plants From Hardwood Cuttings

Buying shrubs and trees for your landscape can get a little expensive. Having a few replacement plants available in case one dies is nice, but it can get to your wallet. If you want to plant the front of your property with a line of your favorite tall shrubs, the cost for such a product can run into hundreds of dollars, but if you are a reasonably talented gardener, there is a way to get around the expense, and have a little gardening fun, and some bragging rights when it is all said and done.

Reproducing plants from hardwood cuttings.

What I am talking about is cloning plants. There are several methods of producing plants, including starting them from seed, which will not give you the desired results if the plant you are trying to grow is a modified hybrid, and tissue culture, which is best done in a well maintained lab. The process we recommend here is similar to tissue culture, but using a lot of tissue. It is cloning from hardwood cuttings, and it is not as hard as it might sound.

First things first

Figure out what plants you want to reproduce. Is it likely that this will grow? Do some research. Some species are more difficult than others. Trees and shrubs like willow, and poplars will produce roots from hardwood cuttings with little effort, oaks, on the other hand are a lot more difficult. Some species may require the use of indol buteric acid like Hormadin which comes in 3 levels based on the difficulty of the project.

What plants you reproduce

This needs to be mentioned. There are plants that you should not replicate from hardwood cuttings or anything else. Please check your states noxious weed list and prohibited exotic species lists if you have any doubt. It might be illegal, so do some research. One large chain of hardware stores was selling a plant that was on one of the “most wanted invaders” list, and even they were unaware of this at the time. We already have too many non native, invasive, alien pests, please don’t increase the problem.

Find a source for your plant material.

If you already have it growing in your landscape, this part will be easy. If not, and the plant you want to clone is in a neighbors yard, ask them about the possibility of getting some cuttings, if they say yes, be sure to take the hardwood cuttings in a way that will not do damage to the mother plant. Be sure and thank the neighbor. I have seen this sort of thing turn into lifelong friendship and project partnering!

However you get the plant material, make sure you will have access to it at the proper time. Assemble the tools and materials you will need, in advance of taking the hardwood cuttings. If you will be planting the cuttings into beds to be dug up and transplanted at a latter time, do all the preparations first. If you plan to put them into nursery pots, make sure you have your containers and all the soil material ready to use, before you even take out the pruners.

Materials you will need

• Potting soil
• Pots or trays suitable for the clone to grow in
• Water for watering the hardwood cuttings in
• If needed, rooting hormone of the proper strength.
• The plant that you want to clone. This should be a healthy plant, with normal growth and vigor.

The tools you will need

• Sharp bypass pruners. Don’t use anvil type pruners because of the tendency to crush the bark against the anvil.
• A sharp knife.

The method

We will take a cutting, which will grow into a clone of the original, using the plants natural tendency to repair and heal itself, to produce new adventitious cells for roots and leaves.

The process

• Take a hardwood cutting 6 to 8 inches long, cut at an angle, with a bud union about a quarter to half inch above the base of the cutting, and one close to the top. This cutting needs to be clean, with no loose or ragged bark. A tip to make this easier, is to keep a very sharp knife handy, and use it to trim the loose or frayed edges. If you are using rooting powder, dip the base of the cutting into it to the depth of the angled cut.
• Place the cutting into the soil, make sure that the base end goes into the soil past the lowest bud union.
• Pack the soil around the base of the cutting lightly.
• Water in.

Follow up

Make sure the soil remains moist at all times. Do not over water. In a few weeks, you will start to see signs of growth, such as the upper bud beginning to swell and develop leaves, and possibly, roots emerging from the drain holes in the pots. Be patient, and diligent in watering. Make a few extra cuttings for the ones that despite your best efforts will not survive, and for the ones you will remove from the pot to check on. It’s OK, I know you will do it! When you do, if you have waited a week or two, you will notice callous developing around the bottom cut. This is where the roots will develop. The ones you remove, will probably not survive.

Note:

No one knows exactly when this was first discovered, but men have been using this method of asexual reproduction for centuries. This has advanced to the science of “tissue cultures”, which take only a few cells to do the same thing.

Window Sill Science:

Soft wood, or green wood cuttings from many plants and a few shrubs and trees can be rooted in a glass of water on the window sill.

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