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DrcEMBKU 28, 1911. 



The Weekly Florists^ Review. 



13 



PEOPAQATING. 



The Early Cuttings. 



It is time now, if you wisli to prac- 

 tice early planting, to get cuttings of 

 some of the slower growing varieties 

 into the sand. Early housing is neces- 

 sary these days if you want to keep 

 up with the band wagon, and especially 

 is this true if you are growing for the 

 wholesale market, where it is ever a 

 case of the survival of the fittest. 



One thing I wish particularly to call 

 to your attention, however, and that 

 is, that if you propagate early, you 

 must make up your mind to give the 

 cuttings room and attention later, lest 

 they become potbound and stunted and 

 far inferior to cuttings which may have 

 been propagated in March. If you 

 are not prepared to give your young 

 plants at least 214-inch pots, and 3- 

 inch will be necessary for some, then 

 you would better wait at least another 

 month before putting the cuttings into 

 the sand. That would not necessarily 

 mean that you could not have splendid 

 success next season, but you could 

 hardly expect to produce such elegant 

 stock by early fall as we see nowadays 

 at the shows. 



Selecting the Cuttings. 



Having provided a suitable propagat- 

 ing bench, with all that is required for 

 properly caring for the cuttings, you 

 are now ready to take the cuttings and 

 prepare them for the sand. Every year 

 there is considerable controversy be- 

 tween the buyer and the seller of car- 

 nation cuttings, as to what is the best 

 kind of cutting. Some maintain that 

 a heel cutting is the only kind that 

 is fit to put into the propagating bench, 

 -and unless they see the heels on the 

 cuttings there is trouble in store for 

 the shipper. Others use the tops of 

 flowering stems which have not begun 

 to run up to bud. With those who 

 propagate only for themselves it is 

 entirely a question of which will make 

 the strongest plant and give the best 

 . results, and, inasmuch as only about 

 one and one-half as many young plants 

 need to be produced as there are plants 

 blooming on the benches, it is an easy 

 matter to get all the good cuttings that 

 are needed. Only in case a rare variety 

 is to be worked up into as much stock 

 as possible, is it necessary to take 

 every good cutting available. 



Two Necessary Precautions. 



In our experience we have found that 

 any kind of shoot will make a good 



cutting, as long as you will observe two 

 things: First, no shoot which has 

 lengthened out enough to show any 

 considerable amount of stem between 

 the blades is fit to propagate. This 

 applies to the pip cuttings. Secondly, 

 if you use only side shoots from flower- 

 ing stems, only good sized, strong 

 shoots should be used. The small 

 shoots from the upper part of the stem 

 will root readily enough, but will pro- 

 duce only small, weak plants, and those 

 high-grade blooms never come from 

 that kind of plant. 



If you propagate only for yourself, 

 you will find no trouble in getting all 

 the cuttings you need from near the 

 base of the flower stems, and all you 

 need to be careful of is . to avoid the 

 small ones, as already mentioned. 



Assuming that you will use this kind 



of cutting, I have drawn a rough sketch 

 of a shoot of this kind; only this shoot 

 had stood on the plant a short time 

 after the bloom had been taken oflf and 

 had grown somewhat in size and 

 strength. Its extra strength has made 

 of it an ideal cutting. 



Trimming the Cuttings. 



In preparing this shoot for the cut- 

 ting bench you will cut off the lower 

 end of the stem, where you see line 

 No. 1 drawn iacross in Figure 1. You 

 will notice that this cut will be just 

 at the base of the next pair of leaves, 

 No. 2. It is just low enough to let 



the joint remain on the cutting and 

 yet high enough to allow you to peel 

 off all of the leaves at No. 2. It is 

 essential that none of these leaves re- 

 main on the stem, as they will only 

 rot and start fungus in your bench. 

 After you have finished the lower part 

 of the cutting, it will appear like 

 Figure 2. Always finish the lower part 

 first, and then go on up the cutting 

 and trim the leaves back as shown in 

 Figure I. 



We do not trim our leaves back as 

 closely as many propagators do, be- 

 cause we think that the young plant 

 will make quicker progress after it is 

 rooted if not trimmed so closely. You 

 will also notice that we cut off the heel, 

 and I can see some growers hold up 

 their bands in horror at this. Now, 

 to start with, we do not choose the 

 heel cutting because we want the heel, 

 but because we want the young shoot 

 which has many, joints. We find, fur- 

 ther, that we can root a batch more 

 evenly and quickly when the hard heel 

 is taken off. In fact, we find that 

 a few varieties will not strike roots 

 at all readily through the heel. Fur- 

 thermore, you will find that when you 

 leave the heels on, they will vary con- 

 siderably in hardness in the same va- 

 riety and the rooting will be uneven, 

 resulting in an uneven lot of plants all 

 the way through. 



Having taken off a batch of cuttings, 

 you will, of course, keep them moist 

 and cool all the time until they are 

 stuck in the sand. While preparing 

 them we have a bucket of fresh water 

 to throw them into as they are being 

 trimmed. This freshens them up well. 



Placing Them in the Sand. 



Have your sand well moistened when 

 packing it down, and firm it well. Then, 

 with an ordinary table knife, draw a 

 line straight across the bench and 

 about an inch deep. Begin at the left 

 end of the bench and begin each row at 

 the back of the bench, working toward 

 you. Stick the cuttings three-fourths 

 of an inch to one inch deep in the sand, 

 the idea being to place them just deep 

 enough to hold them upright when 

 watering, etc. The firmer the sand, 

 the better they will stand up. When 

 you have stuck the last cutting, stick 

 in the label just in front of it. Start 

 the next kind next to the label, filling 

 out the row, and proceed with the next 

 row as before. Some growers work the 

 other way, but we find that under the 

 above method we have the work better 

 in hand and can do better and quicker 



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