Rooting Cuttings In Water.

All readings are taken from a sheltered location in our

garden and cover a 24 hour period starting at 6pm.

Low Temp: 1.6C

High Temp: 14.7C

Rainfall: 0.3mm

Strongest Gust of wind: 2.0 mph

Weather Today: Mostly sunny after a frosty start.

Tonight I'm going to show you a couple of Begonia's that I saved from last summer. They were actually runts that got held back at planting time because they were too small so I kept them in the conservatory as pot plants all summer and then on through the winter. Then around February time when they started putting on new growth I started taking cuttings from them. I suspect a lot of you will already know how to take cuttings from them but for those who don't here is how I do it. Its very simple and hardly any trouble, all you need it a sharp knife and some sort of small container that holds water, I prefer a clear one that way you can see when the roots are forming without having to keep disturbing the cuttings. I think in my example I used the top from a tub of toothpaste but anything similar will do.

Below are the two parent Begonia's

Take your sharp knife and cut off any new growth that is of a similar length to the pieces you see in the picture below, around 2 to 3 inches, don;t worry where you make the cut at the moment.

Now strip off the lower leaves and any flowers leaving just a couple of leaves as in the picture then take your sharp knife and make a clean cut just below a join as I am about to do below.

Thats all there is too it, put your cuttings in the container as below and fill to the top with fresh tap water and be sure to keep it topped up with water until you see the roots forming on the stalks. You can keep them on a warm window sill but be sure to shade from any direct sun light. I always find the kitchen is a good place as its usually warm in there and also its handy for the tap to keep the water level topped up.

Then when you see little roots, if you look closely at the picture you will see what I mean. This is the time to take your cuttings and pot them up in to a general purpose potting compost. Handle the cuttings by their leaves though as the roots are very delicate at this stage.
In about three weeks you will have lots of lovely new plants like the ones I have below, I think I have 40 babies so far from the two plants which I'm really pleased about, especially as they're almost for free and from two plants that nearly got thrown away.
There are quite a few plants that you can root this way, I usually root Impatiens this way and I also find that Fuchsia's root easily in water. Anyway I hope that is of help to someone and if you need to know more just ask - okay.