Semi Ripe Cuttings

T3 Semi Ripe Cuttings, originally uploaded by pennyeast.

Part three in the series about cuttings. Scroll down for the previous two.

Fuchsias are such obliging plants, that almost any little bit of material will root and grow into a new plant. There are times when you have to make the best of what is available. This case usually arises for me when I am wandering around somebody else's garden towards the end of the flowering season and am particularly taken with a cultivar I would like to propagate. Not all plants make new growth in the autumn, so then I resort to semi hardwood - that is wood that is about a year old but is still growing and looking strong and healthy. It is best if you can find a small piece with a couple of new side shoots developing.

Here I took the two new side shoots off carefully (2) and divided the piece of stem so that it yielded two nodal cuttings (5).

The nodes will develop roots fairly easily and I prefer that to inter nodal cuttings on semi ripe wood.

The one side shoot is very small (on the left in picture 3), but if treated as an extreme tip cutting it should take - its worth a try anyway! The other one should root easily and grow into a good plant.

Each of these four cuttings (4) stands a good chance of rooting, although the resulting plants from the pieces of stem may not be of show quality. They will however yield new tip cutting material from which to start well balanced plants!