The Kindest Cuts

Making cuttings is a good way to have more of your favorite plants. Not all respond to this method, but many do. Nurserymen know the advantages of cuttings: Each new plant is a clone, or an exact duplicate, of its parent. Plants from seeds have two parents, which results in variations. Cuttings are just one method of reproducing identical plants; grafting and budding are also used.

Spring is a good time to start cuttings, because it is the time of vigorous growth. Use a clean starting mix--such as sand or vermiculite--with good drainage to avoid rot. A rooting hormone on the cut tip will help, though is not always necessary. Each cutting should be three or four inches long, with the lower leaves removed; insert them halfway down in the medium. Grandmothers used to put empty glass jars over their rose cuttings to keep up the humidity, which keeps the part above ground from drying out before roots have developed. Today, we can fashion a miniature greenhouse using the plastic from the dry cleaners plus the wire coat hangers to form a frame.

Chrysanthemums, marguerites, euryops, felicia, gamolepis and fuchsias, if started now, will bloom this year. I found it was even possible to make cuttings from a lemon tree. Two months after putting it in a plastic bubble all the leaves turned yellow and dropped off. Thinking it beyond hope I moved it into a corner and gave up. The next spring I looked at it, and tiny green leaves were sprouting. Today it is a three-foot espaliered tree in a large pot.

Frost-damaged plants can safely be pruned now and shaped at the same time. Many tender plants that bloom on new growth, such as hibiscus and fuchsias, benefit from being cut back. Be aware that often branches with leaves that have been frozen sometimes have stems that will produce new leaves.

Fertilize summer bloomers with discretion. Bougainvillea and petunias, for instance, will have growth spurts at the expense of bloom if you use a fertilizer with nitrogen, so use a low-nitrogen formula such as 2-10-10 or 0-10-10 instead. Fuchsia and hibiscus, on the other hand, love a high-nitrogen fertilizer since they bloom from new growth.