12 DECORATIVE PLANTS, TREES AND SHRUBS 



made and the time it is rooted (several months at least) it needs a 

 firm and durable base which will not readily decay while the process 

 is going on. The second is to create a kind of a dam to retard the 

 escape of the scanty sap within the cutting, and by thus retarding it 

 contribute to the formation of a callus which will eventually emit 

 roots. These at least are the assumptions we have worked upon, 

 and though we have experimented again and again (a thing all real 

 learners should do) the results have invariably demonstrated the 

 superiority of cuttings made with a heel over those made entirely 

 from current season's growth. 



In the accompanying illustrations (Fig. 3) we have endeavoured 

 to figure a selection of cuttings, the major portion of which are made 

 with heels. They are as follows : 



A Golden Yew (Taxus baccata elegantissima). 



B Irish Yew (Taxus fastigiata). 



C Double Furze 



D Berberis (Herberts stenophylla). 



E Juniper (Juniperus sinensis). 



F Aucuba (Aucubajaponica). 



G Cypress (Cupressus lawsoniana). 



H Laurel (Laurus caucasicus). 



I Arbor Vitae (Thuja lobbi). 



J Euonymus (Euonymus). 



K Laurestine (Laurestinus). 



A small proportion of these cuttings are made without a heel, but 

 where this is so it is either because the base is below the current 

 season's growth and the wood therefore harder and so equivalent 

 to a heel, or because the character of the wood is softer and sappier 

 and therefore more quickly rooting. The golden privet is a very 

 good example of this latter, for it will strike just as readily without 

 a heel as with one. This shrub can also be readily propagated from 

 soft wood in heat, and is so increased by many thousands every 

 year. Flowering shrubs, grown and forced in pots, such as Deutzia 

 gracilis, Hydrangea paniculata, staphyllea and ceanothus, are often 

 propagated from the forced wood exactly in the same manner as 

 fuchsias and other greenhouse plants are propagated, viz. from the 

 tips of young growths. But of course these are the exceptions 



