Why I Oughta...

Number 3 on my 2023 to-do list is to plant out the front porch bed .  In that listing, I talked about planting some color in the form of Disneyland Roses that I received as a Christmas present from Nat's mom.  She ordered us three bareroot roses from Jackson and Perkins - which is where she had purchased our three previous floribunda roses.   These three arrived in a cardboard box with instructions to first re-hydrate the roots by soaking them in a bucket of water for anywhere from two hours to a full day.  I opted for what I'd call 'most' of a day.  I put them in the bucket one evening, then planted them the next afternoon in the bed. Below is a look at these as they are soaking in water to rehydrate. They came with these little metal tags: As they were soaking, I dug out the three holes.   And watered the holes in to get them wet.   Then I placed each of the bareroot roses in their hole - see below. And applied a little bit of Rooting Powder to the bases of each of t

Ten days ago, I posted a couple of photos a new (to me) project of trying to grow hydrangeas from cuttings .  I tried two different culitvars (Limelight and Strawberry Vanilla) at the time and frankly...I wasn't sure if what I was doing was going to work and/or if it was going to be too late in the growing season to even attempt these. I still don't have the answer to the second question (is it too late?), but I do have a mixed-results answer to how they would do.  That answer?  The Limelight seems to have transitioned from cutting to (potentially) rooted.  The Vanilla Strawberry cutting?  Not so much. Here, below, is the limelight cutting.  The most critical thing to note?  The new, lighter color leaves at the center.  These new leaves are a sign that this cutting has managed to 'take hold': The larger leaves are cut.  And that's on purpose.  I trimmed them in half as a way to try to help the little cutting survive.  Some plantsmen call them 'solar panels'

Along with the Catalpa tree seeds/seedlings work and the transplanting of the Kentucky Coffee Tree seedlings into larger containers, I came across a video that talked about growing hydrangeas from cuttings.  So...I figured....why not give it a try.   The process is pretty easy.  Find a shoot that is still green.  Count down three pairs of leaves and give the shoot a cut.  I then dipped the stem in rooting compound, trimmed all the leaves off - and even trimmed the remaining leaves in half - and stuck it in some potting mix.   I'm trying this with two species:  on the left below (the sad one) is Strawberry Vanilla Hydrangea.  On the right is a Limelight Hydrangea.  I stuck them in a couple of pots that I formerly had Kentucky Coffee tree seedlings that I had on hand:  Below is a closer look at the Limelight.  After I took this photo, I trimmed the top leaves in half to try to give the little cutting a bit less plant to try to support.   I have concerns that I've taken on this pr

In late January, I tried a succulent propagation experiment with one variable:  cutting vs callus'd-over pieces of Burro's Tail.  I used rooting compound and went about planting two small containers of little pieces of succulent.  In the green, plastic container, I planted segments that I sliced in-to and then applied the rooting compound.  In the clay pot, I left the segments with their calluses and just rubbed rooting compound on the surface.  The little white post-it note says:  "Uncut = Clay".  (I keep an offline garden diary of sorts, too...) Four-or-so-weeks later, here's what those two containers look like: What has happened?  The cuttings on the left - the ones that I sliced into with a knife BEFORE applying the rooting compound have just melted away.  On the right - the ones that I left intact?  Many of them are still there and doing just fine.   Lesson learned:  when propagating succulents, make sure they have completely callused over before attempting

Last week, I started my Winter propagation journey with a new bottle of Rooting Powder and talked about how I was planning on taking up some projects including using some cuttings (or, frankly...more like 'fallings' - because they just fall off the plant) of Burro's Tail and our Christmas Cactus.  I've had success with lazy propagation with my Burro's Tail over the years, but that was at my office on the 64th floor.  This post and photo from 2018 show a good look at the mother plant, a set of soil-rooted babies and a clear cup of water-rooted cuttings.   I have a series of pieces of this succulent that we've had laying in pots/containers for a number of months, but haven't really been dedicated to getting them to root and was mostly just leaving it to 'hope' that they'd take off.  So, I went off to YouTube to figure out what the *right* way to propagate these are - in soil or in water.  I learned that you should (ideally) allow the cutting to

On my Winter Gardening to-do list are a few propagation-related items:  Being more deliberate with propagating some of the Burro's Tail buds that seem to fall off of the main vines everyday and starting to propagate our Christmas Cactus .  To do both of those, I'm going to give this Rooting Powder from Bonide a shot.  For Burro's Tail, I've had luck WITHOUT this rooting hormone , but that all was when I was in a downtown high-rise window.   I'll post some photo updates when I get around to planting these small cuttings in their own containers and will experiment with how this rooting powder helps/doesn't help with getting them going.