Revealed How to Take The Best Rose Cuttings
Save yourself a fortune in expensive rose plants by learning how to take rose cuttings successfully and easily. Rose cuttings are an excellent way of increasing the number of rose plants in your garden, for selling or to give away to friends. Share the beauty and the love – learn how to take a cutting from your beautiful rose plant.
Before taking a rose cutting it is important to know what type of rose you’re trying to propagate.
BUSH ROSES These are easily grown from cuttings, but some varieties do better if budded on to briars, close to the ground. In November break off side shoots of new wood with a heel of old wood and set two-thirds of their length in the ground. These will bloom the following year. Place three cuttings in a pot in November and by the following June, you will have a pot plant.
RAMBLER ROSES During the winter cut all the old wood that has borne flowers and leave three or four of the strongest shoots of new wood which have no side shoots. Most people do not prune ramblers severely enough. A profusion of fine bloom will result if they are treated in this way. To strike cuttings from ramblers, take a piece of wood of this year’s growth that has flowered, and leave a piece of the old wood at the bottom, place this in the ground in late October, and in the spring long shoots will be thrown up from the base. Hundreds of cuttings can be put in a small space. These can be potted up, or the roots can be packed in a little damp sawdust and given away to friends or even sold.
STANDARD ROSES These make for space in the garden for other plants, as the ground underneath them can be utilized for annuals. Standard roses are expensive to buy, so it is as well to bud briars for your own use. Obtain some briars in late autumn. These are the wild roses from the hedges and are merely straight stems. In the spring they throw out side shoots. Bud on to these side shoots in summer as close to the main stem as possible. With a sharp knife make a T-shaped cut through the bark. Separate the bark from the wood with the back of a knife-blade. Select a bud from the middle part of a shoot, that has not yet flowered, taken from the variety which you wish to grow.
How to take Standard Rose Cuttings
Cut the bud out, cutting upwards. Then with the back of the blade take out the wood, leaving as much of the green inner bark as possible. Take care that the bud is not hollow, Leave the leaf stalk as shown, for holding the bud.
Then insert the bud under the T- shaped cut on the new wood of the briar stock. Place a piece of bast in front of the bud, and then bring it around behind the leaf stalk and bind the cut parts together. This operation is really very simple. It is advisable, however, to practice once or twice on a piece of ash, or on any twig possessing bark that will lift easily. After budding nip off the tips of the side shoots. As soon as the bud starts into growth, cut the wild part back close to the bud. When budding is done in autumn the buds usually remain dormant until the following spring.
