The cranberry plants I divided earlier this year are putting on lots of new growth. I have about a dozen potted plants now from the two that I purchased three years ago. Strangely, they haven't produced many flowers (and hence, fruit) during this time. I wonder if there is something I should be doing that I'm not.
I also have seven raspberry plants that I grew from suckers taken from our old garden. After I potted them up, I placed them inside a sealed plastic bag for about a month until sufficient roots formed to support the foliage. I love this everbearing variety and was glad that they survived. They've since been moved to my community garden plot.
On the left-hand side are black and red currant hard wood cuttings that I took in early spring. I removed about half of the buds and applied some rooting hormone to the cut ends before potting them up and placing them into a sealed plastic bag for about 6 weeks. From the 6 cuttings that I took, 4 went on to root successfully. I imagine they all would have survived if I'd noticed that they'd become infested with whiteflies and tiny leaf-eating caterpillars while they were covered in plastic.
Soon, I plan on taking even more cuttings from from all of the fruit shrubs around our townhouse. It'll be a few years before we settle into a more permanent home. By then, I hope to have a ton of potted fruit shrubs ready to be transplanted.
What a great idea to take cuttings from all the fruit shrubs around your townhouse. Especially since you have the wonderful conservatory to house them in the mean time. You will have a very nice collection and so much variety.
ReplyDeleteI have to try this next year! I'm thinking my currant bushes could use a few friend, and I could espalier them around the main garden. Such an awesome idea.
ReplyDeleteVery nice. Good way to get more from your plants.
ReplyDeleteThat's great, Thomas. Glad to hear they are mostly growing well. :o)
ReplyDeleteI need to do more of this too. I propogate the tree kale from cuttings (have several rooting out currently) and I always root out runners from strawberries to rejuvenate the strawberry patch periodically, but that is about the limit of my rooting out plants to increase my garden plantings. Thanks for the inspiration.
ReplyDelete