Re: Personal experience with plant rooting hormones

None of these messages are signed.  I am wondering who we are talking to.  
The rooting procedures for home gardeners are not the same for professionals 
who need hundreds or thousands of cuttings to strike in order to stay in 
business.

Home gardeners can increase their success by checking the part of the plant 
used, the best type of cutting (half-hard, heel, etc.) and the time of year 
that gives the best results.

Many a rose grower gets a cutting with a mayonaise jar over the cutting in a 
shady spot, left over winter and finding a plant in the spring.  Dealing with 
cuttings at home will result in losing a good part of them but also 
succeeding with a goodly amount.

The first rose cuttings I tried defoliated nearly immediately and I thought 
the process was over but it was not.  They rooted late in the summer and were 
small plants the following spring.  

My experience, which does not include professional numbers of cuttings,  is 
that two powder forms of rooting hormone can be purchased.  One for soft 
cuttings, perennials and one for shrubs.  There are many others but these two 
in small amounts are all a home gardener would need.  There is also a very 
old controversy as to the efficacy of a product kept on the shelf more than 
six months.  I don't know that I have ever read anything that settled that.

I used peat and sand mixed together for years because it works.  I have never 
changed that mix although there are certainly many others.

A home gardener who wants to try rooting cuttings should be encouraged with 
some success stories and not discouraged with highly technical information 
that is not necessary for a half dozen hydrangea plants.  A great many plants 
will root with no hormones.  Another and easier method is layering.   If you 
lose some cuttings, try some research on the best season, best type of 
cutting and try again.  Some of the cutting will always fail, that should not 
discourage you.  One of the problems with home produced cuttings is that 
attention is needed to care for the cutting, water, etc.  One does not always 
have the time to give this specialized attention.  Still bunches of them will 
root and many are very easy.  

Willow and forsythia will root in a vase.  Hydrangea is easy, many viburnums 
are easy.  Perennials need to be done in just the right season to get roots 
and plants but if done so are also mostly easy.  A propagation manual with 
the best times and plant parts will give you all the help needed to get 
started.  A great many of the shrubs in my garden were started from gifted 
cuttings. The new Ken Druse book on propagation is excellent.

There are some that are very reluctant to root, rhododendrons for one which 
yield to layering.  

In short, try more than once and do not worry too much about the correct 
hormone chemical makeup.

BTW, I am still working my way through computer backlogs.  If I owe you a 
message, I will get to it.  

Claire Peplowski
NYS zone 4

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