Top Tips For Propagation

Spring has finally sprung, the days are getting longer, the temperature is getting warmer, and it's time to plant for summer. We've compiled our top tips to get the best out of your cuttings.

- Use a sharp, sterile blade to take the cutting. Sterility is essential with cuttings, a dirty blade is one of the easiest ways to introduce disease into a fresh cut, right at the point when the plant has no roots or defences to fight it off.
- Take your cuttings at the healthiest node you can find. The node is where the leaf meets the stem, and it's also where new roots will actually develop from, so a healthy, vigorous node gives your cutting the best possible starting point.
- Using a rooting hormone helps to ensure success, it encourages root development at the cut site and gives the wound a bit of protection while it heals. Make sure to tip some of the rooting hormone into a separate vessel, then dip your cuttings into that. This way, you aren't contaminating the entire bottle of rooting hormone with whatever's on your cutting.
- Place cuttings in a well-draining mix, such as perlite or vermiculite. You do not want the medium to be sodden, a saturated mix pushes out the oxygen your developing roots need and creates the damp conditions that rot and fungal issues thrive in.
- Keep cuttings moist, and do not let them dry out. But be careful not to overwater them. You want them to be damp like a sponge you'd wipe the bench with, not a sponge you need to squeeze out.
- Aim for gentle bottom warmth around 22–25°C at the root zone if you can manage it, root development slows noticeably in cooler conditions, even when everything else about your setup is right.
- Tall cuttings tend to fall over, so place supports around them to prevent this, a cutting that's constantly toppling wastes energy trying to right itself instead of putting that energy into rooting.
- Do not store your cuttings in direct sunlight and keep them covered, old water bottles cut in half can be used to do this if you don't have a propagation dome. The idea is to trap humidity around the leaves, since a leafy cutting with no roots yet will lose water faster than it can be replaced without that boost in humidity. Keep it mostly sealed for the first several days, then start easing the cover off gradually as roots develop, rather than removing it all in one go.

If you are new to propagating and want to hone your skills before hacking up your precious monstera, try taking a cutting from one of these easy-to-propagate plants:
- Pothos
- Tradescantia (also known as Purple Heart)
- Rosemary
- Philodendron
Hydrangeas
- Succulents
These are forgiving enough to root in a wide range of conditions, so they're a great way to build confidence in reading what a healthy, rooting cutting actually looks like before you move on to fussier plants.

If you want to take your propagation to the next level, we recommend an Ez-Cloner. An Ez-Cloner does exactly as the name suggests, it makes cloning (propagating) easy. These are aeroponic units that constantly provide a gentle mist of water to the root zone while keeping the rest of the cutting suspended in the air from the top. Because the root zone is getting a steady supply of oxygenated moisture rather than sitting in a static medium, this leads to maximum exposure and oxygen utilisation, giving you more robust roots and a noticeably higher success rate, especially useful if you're taking a large batch of cuttings at once and want consistency across the whole tray.

Whatever plant you are propagating this spring, follow our tips, and you'll be sure to have success.

If you want to know more, visit your local Hyalite store. Our team will be happy to assist you.