I recently had to give a demo on plant propagation, so turned up to the venue with a forsythia in a container that had plenty of good cuttings material on it. I duly took the cuttings, prepared them – as in the picture below – potted them up in multi-purpose compost – all done by the book – then brought them home, put the pot outside and forgot all about them.
Remove the lower leaves - you need a good balance between leaves and bare stem (right)
I did none of the things you are supposed to – tenting them to keep them firm, protecting them from the worst of the weather – and they did actually wilt, as was to be expected given this level of neglect. I was too lazy even to bin them. But I noticed they were looking a bit brighter the other day, and behold! They are rooting.
What with all this rain, they have had no chance to dry out – that obviously gave them a fighting chance. I’ll give proper instructions on what you should do in my next newsletter.
So now I have several little forsythias for growing on – a pity I don’t like the plant more.
July 21, 2009 at 4:38 pm |
I LOVE forsythia! For me, it accompanies daffodils, heralding spring. Yellow flowers and Spring were made for each other. Of course, our forsythia doesn’t actually flower (you diagnosed over-pruning), but I live in hope for next year! 🙂
Interesting though… this does rather back up my belief that nature is rather more robust than we give it credit for!
July 21, 2009 at 4:51 pm |
Well, yes! Forsythia is great in spring, and yellow is exactly the colour we cannot have enough of after a miserable winter – but it can be a dreary passenger later on (or am I being too harsh?).