Plant Propagation New Year

I sent that because Vern was through eating and he wanted back in his chair. And he wants it now. Housekeeper will be here tomorrow. I finally got the few Christmas items I put out, put away today.

I was cheering for Kansas City Chiefs and was disappointed in the final outcome but they played a good game. Probably messed up the sports book because a lot of bets were on the Chiefs and I do not think the Patriots made the spread. We will hear tomorrow morning. I was also rooting for the Saints but casually. No reason for me to watch the Super Bowl. We had rain Wednesday and Thursday. Sumac thre got so heavy from the rain which caused a very large branch to brake. I called the HOA landscapers and they came by and cut off the large branch and then trimmed several others because they were also going to break. Helps to have guys with a chain saw on your friend's list. I spend a lot of money on ice cream bars and sodas in the summer but never get turned down when I need help.

You all stay warm and maybe next year you might want to head toward Vegas for a few weeks.

Sharon Hey Vegas could be a winter thought ,
I was hoping the chiefs would win also , oh well ,
Everything here is iced over and snow covered

Wow, Keith, now that is truly cold. But you have beautiful summers.

Ice is not good, I still remember ice when I was a teen when Dad was stationed in Maine, then to Delaware, then to Massachusetts, I started to learn to drive in Mass. my poor mom and her white knuckles...LOL.

Some years here in FL are like yours Sharon, but not the past two, this year we're certainly getting all the cold fronts down here, it was 36F when I got up this morning, it is ten now and still just 44 degrees. Was just outside to uncover some plants and my toes and fingers are numb.

Wow, lots of beautiful props in here!

I planted my wandering jew prop last week and he's really been taking off. I've also been patiently waiting for some of my sedeveria Harry Butterfield to root. Well, at least one of them has! And the other looks like he's well on his way. This is honestly my very first time doing anything real with plants so this is really exciting! I feel like a good plant dad for the first time in my life. I've killed so many barrel cacti.

I've had almost all of my plants under a full-spectrum lamp for the winter (my tiny office is so crowded) on a timer for 7 hours a day. I keep it pretty warm in here, so I think that's why I've been having so much success with propagating in the winter.

Thank you for the warm welcome in this cold season, oxdriftgardener and all! :)

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This message was edited Jan 22, 2019 4:19 AM

Yup, ground temps are what create growth... 50* is a wake up call, 60* is a growing temp, after 90* ground temp the plants wait...as a good general rule of thumb.


This message was edited Jan 22, 2019 10:50 PM

60 today but 32 tonight and 48 tomorrow. I'm getting about a pond a week cleaned when it's warm enough

Tried to do bulbs in water, they grew til they turned yellow leafed. Disgusted so I took them out and planted them next to neighbors fence since he moved himself and dogs away. Planted last 24 bulbs with them. In 2 days time those yellow leaves turned green and a bloom stalk hopped up. My pics won't load. Our internet is being slow and stubborn...got one! Many have bloomed in this area and are fading, so I guess mine are different- have always called them paperwhites. Still waiting opening

Just did some rare to me winter propagation. When I did my Winnipeg plant shopping trip last April I was very happy to find 2 plants that were on my "must have" list. Senecio Angel Wings in photo #1 and Euphorbia Ascot Rainbow in # 2. From experience I have found that a lot of these plants that I get excited about don't excite a lot of other people because they don't know how to use them. So when they don't sell well of course the greenhouses don't bring them in again. So when I was taking cuttings in the fall I hacked the 2 pots that they were in apart and made one pot out of 2 and have been nursing it in the living room up to now. I also saved a big chunk of oxalis that was in the same pot as the Euphorbia. They are really easy to find in the spring but I grow a lot and they are really easy to take cuttings from so why not save a bit of money.
At the same time as I did all that I experimented at taking a cutting of the Senecio along with all the other succulents. That cutting is photo #4. It is not thriving but is still alive and hopefully will perk up when I can get it in the greenhouse. Last week I noticed that the original Senecio was looking really ill so I took 2 more cuttings from the healthiest tips. Yesterday I took cuttings from the Euphorbia and oxalis. Photo 5 is all the new cuttings ready to spend the next 2 weeks under a humidome. If the mission is successful I will then discard the pot I have been overwintering. Meanwhile the dying Senecio has to be chopped now.

I wonder if a tray up above the water in an aquarium would act like a humidome (there are lids on the aquarium) or end up with plants rotting? How humid is your dome Keith?

Sorry Gypsi if I conveyed the image that the humidome I use is some sophistically regulated propagator. It is simply a clear plastic dome that is fitted to the plant tray and prevents it from drying out. The amount of humidity depends on how much you water the soil. In this picture you can probably see a small amount of moisture collected on the plastic. That is about perfect. Like you say if you get it too moist the plants will rot. I keep an eye on them daily and over the 2 week period I may take the lid off once or twice and give them a light misting. Since the furnace is running more now than when I usually do cuttings I may have to mist more often. The domes that I use for cuttings are about 6 " high. I have other ones about 2" high for seeding. The fluorescent lights are on a timed for about 12 hours a day

Keith my Euphorbia Ascot Rainbow sowed seeds and they are coming up. I also have the dark purple with red tip Euphorbia. It is in it's 3rd year and made it through the freeze. When I purchased it it was in a 3.5" pot. About 4 inches tall and two stems. Now it is about 1 1/2' tall with probably 10 or more stems. I will go take a look tomorrow and take a photo for you.

Phoenix, good luck. I have killed more plants trying to propagate over winter than can be counted. It is a learned skill. Keith and JU are both good. You will learn from them. Kitt is a trooper and hard worker and now that she is retired from trucking and home she will leave these two in the dust. LOL.

I have a pink Mexican bird of paradise broke ground today. Been on a heat pad and under a dome for over 6 weeks. I forgot to file the seeds. There are 5 seeds in the pot. I am hoping for a few more.

Thank you! expect an aquaponic and protected from cats propagation experiment when I finish bookkeeping.

This message was edited Jan 24, 2019 12:01 AM

Gypsi, those are long stems on those bulbs.

I have the new Plant's Delight catalog and several of the plants that caught my eye in a 3.5" pot were $50. I will wait. But I will be 77 in August so I cannot wait forever. I need to order my coleus from Rosey Dawn. Better hurry because I am way behind. Some of my favorites are probably sold out.

JU, how is your weather. We are headed back into the upper 60s. My poor garden is really confused. One large Durant tree got nipped and the one closest to the house is fine. I did some cleanup today and watered the plumeria and other zone pushers that are in the garage. Time to put DH to bed. Hugs, Sharon.

Sharon we at 20 degrees here this morning , gray day and 2 degrees predicted for tonight
I have several small plants started , Echinacea , Bronze fennel , lots of spider plants nicotania , my cuttings are iffy so far ,
Too cold outside still , suppose to be below zero several days coming up ,
I hate winter ,,,,,,

You can see in backgrounds that sometimes this does not go as well it could

Croton yes it is still here lol
Spider plants and fern leaf lavender
some stringy agastache taking the bag off time may get difficult
A small bronze fennel I have four containers of these
an Aloe ,

Sharon, some of my salvia got nipped again on top- surprised it is even alive. The stems on those narcissus aren't as tall as they get before I cut them down in July. The blooms are just waiting still. My lack of sunlight has me aggravated so am cutting back on stuff and getting my old furniture refinished (oiled). Had to stop sanding and let my elbow bones firm back up, chuckl. Here is a warm picture from many years ago. Grandkids and mare pet that we sold a few years later. AND a Boerne, (Burn ee) Texas one from Oct last year

Hey all! I'm so jealous of those of you in warmer climates, beautiful pictures. It's snowy and cold in Canada!

I've had some truly impressive luck with my sedum props. I think I mentioned they were left outside in the -7°C week-long cold snap we had, and the rest of the winter up until 10 days ago. Well, I can't believe how hard these little guys are tryin', it's so inspiring to watch.

If I could get some advice, what do I do from here? I haven't disturbed them but I know they need to be a bit further apart. Do I plant the roots or just let them find their way into the soil?

given my luck with sedums I am going to defer to wiser folks phoenix

Really, problems with sedums in Texas?! That's surprising. As I understand it that's almost a perfect climate for sedums! I don't know the geography of the US very well, but it gets humid in parts of Texas, right? But sorta dry in others?

The indoor humidity in my office if I had to guess would be about 70-80% (I vape like a steam engine and the outdoor humidity is about 50-80% on any given day) and I keep it warm, about 20°-25°C in here too. That's likely why I've had a lot of success.

You can just let them find their own way. If you want to intervene st all, just sprinkle a tiny bit of soil on top of the root
Keith

Hi Phoenix. All of the succulents in this photo were started as leaf cuttings lying on top of the soil just like your sedums. I started them in the greenhouse last April or May. They have never been outside yet. After i shut down the greenhouse they spent the rest of the summer under a fluorescent light in my wife's laundry room and since I brought all my other succulents inside last fall they have been on a plant stand with lights in a spare bedroom/plant nursery in the basement. The lights on that stand are new ones that I purchased at Costco last fall.They are very different. They are LED grow lights from Innova Lighting. They have both red and blue lights operated on separate switches, so you can operate with only red, only blue or both. I have had both on all winter and am very happy with how the succulents are doing but the coleus not so good.
If you look close you can still see the original leaf on a lot of them and they are kind of standing upright. They were laying flat until I potted them up last fall. There are still 2 that have no new leaves. They have strong roots so I am not giving up on them yet.
I have a very large collection of succulents and we live in Zone2/3 so everything has to be brought in for the winter.
Originally I was bringing everything in as stem cuttings and I have just recently been experimenting with the leaf cuttings. It is a low process but I have gotten some very nice plants that way. I find with the Echeverias you get a lot of double and triple rosettes that way which is really nice
Enjoy
Keith

Like Keith said. Texas has 4 seasons all year long- sometimes every day- it also has something like 4 or 5? geological areas. The mighty Mississippi River divides our continent. West is desert, dry high plains and limestone caprock. The farther east you go toward the Ms Rver it gets greener (toward the Ark/Louisiana state lines). South where I am humidity is rarely below 70% and many varieties of succulents don't do well. Weeds do awesome! It is why all the northerners head for southern climes come winter- it is actually bearable here. In our western deserts cacti can actually live for 6 yrs without a rooting medium at all. However, just like tradescantia, if the leaf finds it falls on soil ( a natural plant propagation survival technique) they will root and thrive. Good luck!

I just place my succulent leaves on the top of soil and leave them alone. We are very dry here. Usually less than 10% humidity. Keith has it down. I have them out year round and have to worry more about the direct sun than the cold. But this year we had a 2 day freeze and some got whacked. I looked at some today and decided to just leave them and see what they do.

I trimmed the roses in the front and cleaned up the freeze whacked creeping Jenny. It will come right back. I will get some mulch next week and cover it and it will grow like a weed, which I think that is what it is.

First photo is pink oxalis. Second photo is purple and third is rainbow Euphorbia. Forth is our temps for next 7 days and Fifth is Crown of Thorns plant. It is half nipped and half OK. I found out about Crown of Thorns. I tried to drag off nipped leaves with my bare hand and ran into the thorns.



This message was edited Jan 26, 2019 3:33 PM

This is my Pink Mexican Bird of Paradise germination. I gave it some sun today. A little pale. I am moving it into a more sunny place tomorrow. It has taken over a month to germinate. There are 4 more seeds in the pot.

Keith, you do very well with the indoor plants, I wish I could grow more succulents here, but have lost so many, too wet. No indoor plants, too many cats.
Sharon you're having some nice temperatures, plants like that. My crown of thorns is doing okay and flowering nicely right now, we've not had any freezing temps this year thank goodness, some frost.
Ju, you're doing pretty good with all that cold outside going on.

This is the wandering Jew where I walk, one area of it, that fence behind is someone's side garden where it has escaped to the outside. There is another area in the woods full of wandering Jew, I'll get a picture of that another day.

Thanks Sherri. Nice wandering Jew shots.
Keith

Keith, my goodness, those succulents are incredible. I'd love a link to those LED grow lights. If you could DM that to me that would be great; I'm not entirely sure where to start but, I've at least got a lot of time before next winter!

I've got an update for my little wandering jew (T. pallida) prop! One of the leaves unfortunately died but the other one's growing beautifully. When I mist the little sedum leaves I just spray more water around the wandering jew and that seems to make him happy enough.

When the freezing temps were announced, I didn't even think of my Crown of Thorns. It sits in full sun and 112 degrees didn't faze it one bit.

The photo is my baby potatoes I planted over a month ago. Among them is a shallot.

I trim back my mimosa in the background of the KOI pond way back every winter. During our sprig and summer it takes on the appearance of a very large fern. I took out m sawsall today and proceeded to saw off the branches. I got one removed but then stopped. To heavy for me to hold up and to high up fo me to reach. My gardener will be here tomorrow and he has a saw on a pole. He will do it for me.

I did try to replace a reverse osmosis faucet today but needed a part that did not come with the on line order. I will go to the plumbing store in the morning to get the part. It is in the sink area on Vern's side of the bathroom and getting under the sink was a pain for an older lady. Should have got the handyman but just to stubborn.

Sherri, your wandering jew looks like my silver dichondra.

First photo is hole where faucet is suppose to be. LOL.

Hi Sharon. OMG. I didnt know you were also a plumber! Potatoes have me intrigued. What a world of difference in our growing conditions compared to here. If I posted a picture of a potato that I had planted over a month ago it would be 2 feet tall and about as wide. Sounds like a dumb question but just how did you plant them. We cut up chunks of last year's potato with at least 2 eyes per chunk and bury them in the soil but they never look that delicate even when they first come up. In all my years I have never heard of a potato seed but looking at those delicate starts I'm wondering???
Keith

Sharon you sound like me under the sinks , I was doing time last year doing plumbing , New kitchen sink and all new lines , Water heater and washer all new lines and washer box ,
Under the sink anymore my arm and shoulder aches and does not reach where I want it to go ,,lol ?

Keith ,yellow potato seeds have been offered for some time not a real new thing though ,

Enjoying all the little seedling photo's seems to bring joy to everyone ,me too !!!

Sun, that wandering jew is the kind I have trouble keeping alive as a potted plant. I've not had much luck outdoors either. Now the furry kind comes back every year, but mine is currently dormant out on my lot.

I'd rather do plumbing than carburetor but Saturday I learned to adjust my edelbrock and the truck is running better now.

Thànks Ju, that is a new one on me.
You ladies never cease to amaze me; plumbing, adjusting carburetors, all things that I suck at.

Chuckl, never fails, if you are married to a plumber, its the partner that has to do the home plumbing. Can be said of all trades, chuckl, but I had to learn since, like Gypsi, I depend on me. Simple plumbing isn't hard, but when you get to pressure testing welds on gas lines, etc, it gets a bit more technical. Keith your succulents look good. Sharon, I am right there with you about trying to bite off more than I can handle these days. I do a lot of scheming to find alternatives to fixing the messes too.

Well, I got got one faucet installed with no problem, after going to plumbing shop to get right part. Then I started on the second faucet, the one on my side of the bathroom and ran into a problem. Same faucet, same cabinet and same counter type, just on my side of bathroom but line that is to secure to cabinet is to short. If I put on the rubber washer and metal washer, there is not enough length to tighten the locking bolt. And I am under the cabinet, laying on a rug and I have to get just right under there or I am in immediate big time pain. As soon as I get in the right position, I am OK. I am going to call my brother in Reno tomorrow and question him. He knows everything there is to know about plumbing.

Keith, the potatoes are baby creamer potatoes. I buy a bag at Costco and split it with my daughter. About a month ago I had 6 left over that had developed eyes and shriveled so I decided to plant them. I have attached a photo of my current bag.

Time for Vern to go to bed.

I can never figure out where to put succulents and I water too much, lol
Going to look up creeping jenny

Gypsi same here ,, a few hardy

Keith , always something new , lol Gals are good aren't they , lol ,lol ,

I got one faucet installed. Went to lumbing store, couldn't be helped. Went to Lowe and they only had one RO faucet. Right length but to weird attachments for some 1/4' hoses. I hooked it up without and of course it leaked. So I searched for a plug for the 1/4'' line and could not find one in the irrigation parts. So being a kludge expert, I went out into the garden and cut one off a line. Now I just need to remember to do something with that line before I turn on the system. I tuned on the water and no leak. So all the faucets in the house, (5) are working except mine in the bathroom.

So with that done and all my tools put away, it was time to start Vern's dinner after I walked the dogs for the second time.

So I did not make it out into the garden. I was going to trim a few more roses and pull up the frozen tomatoes. Have an appointment tomorrow so I will have to do that Thursday.

I watched the weather this evening on the news as I was making dinner. Unbelievable temperatures. With temperatures like that, more than half of the plants in town, including trees, would die.

I was raised in a small mining town by a miner and I was the oldest child. I could shovel like a man, probably at the age of 10. I handle a pick like a man and until recently, could out work most men in the garden. But I do not do electricity.

Well, another good day. No ambulances or paramedics at the house, no need to go to the doctor and we both woke up. Now time to go to bed. That is what Vern and I say to each other every night before we go to sleep.

Hugs to you all. Sharon

Sharon , if the plugs were all in place and building wiring , you could do generators lol sort of ? Start those right up and lights ta da ,
Sill proves that plumbing takes some practice , if your out of practice it can get tedious ,,( that is a personal experience note lol)

wind woke me up , 30 mph at 0 degrees , Insulation could be better where lines enter under the washroom , so I went and took a quick look , all okay so far ,

Zero positive artic atmosphere (as I have said many times ) gives me pressure headaches ,,

I'm with you Keith, these woman amaze me and how much they can do. I can fix the drip irrigation system, change a tire, fix a toilet flapper, but not much more. My husband is so handy, not a thing he can't fix, I hand him the tools ☺. When it comes to the garden though, I'm a workhorse...I always tell my husband he'll probably find me dead face down in the dirt one day. LOL.

Jim, I was just looking at the temperatures, so many double negatives, I can't even imagine, I've lived in cold states as a kid but still never had to endure double negatives.