68 



PLANT PROPAGATION 



transplanting. Often special flower pots with open sides 

 (Fig. 57) are used in this method; but as good results are 

 secured with moss alone as with them. 



101. Mound or stool layering (Fig. 55), which consists 

 of burying the bases of shrub stems deeply with earth, thus 

 forcing the striking of roots, is of special utility in propa- 

 gating short-stemmed and stiff-branched shrubs. Quinces, 

 English gooseberries and Paradise apple stocks are so grown. 

 When many plants are desired, it is common the previous 

 season to cut down the shrubs to be used thus so as to 



produce numerous 

 shoots close to the 

 ground and the center of 

 the shrub. Preparatory 

 to covering, these shoots 

 are wounded close to the 

 ground so roots will be 

 produced quickly in 

 abundance. One sea- 

 son's growth is usually 

 enough to make plants capable of being used for 

 setting out. The advantage of the method is that strong, 

 stocky plants are thus produced. 



102. Runners (Fig. 60), special, usually creeping 

 branches formed by strawberry and some other plants, 

 produce little clusters of leaves at each second node 

 from which, under favorable conditions, roots are devel- 

 oped and thus new plants formed. All that is necessary 

 to have the roots develop is to anchor the rosettes of 

 leaves with clods of earth or pebbles for a few days. 



Often the runners are made to root in 2 or 2 V* -inch flower pots 

 plunged full depth in the strawberry bed and filled with good soil. 

 Such plants usually give better results than those allowed to grow 

 without this restriction, because there is little or no loss of roots 

 when the potted plants are transplanted. 



Four to eight plants may be produced in succession by one runner ; 

 but since the later ones are considered inferior and weak because 

 they have less time in which to grow, only the first one or perhaps 

 two rosettes on any one runner are allowed to grow for making 



FIG. 59 STYLES OF LAYERING POTS 



