Plant Propagation: A Detailed Guide For Beginners

Benefits

By propagating plants you already own, you have unlimited potential to expand your collection, and fill your home and gardens with as much green as you want.

Here are a few other benefits of learning how to reproduce plants:

• Free plants – Have a new garden area or containers you want to fill on a tight budget? You can do it for free by multiplying the plants you already have.

• Trade for new varieties – Get new varieties by swapping cuttings, seeds, or starts with neighbors and friends.

• Overwinter cuttings only – Keep your favorite tropicals and annuals by overwintering the cuttings or small divisions, rather than bringing the whole container into the house.

• Gift giving – Give indoor or garden plants away as presents (they make great housewarming gifts)! Your friends will love the thoughtful gift, and they’ll never know it was free for you.

Sexual Plant Propagation

The primary reproduction method for most plants is sexual – through the pollination of flowers! As long as they aren’t sterile, most will form seeds after the flowers have been pollinated.

By harvesting the seeds that are naturally produced, you can grow more plants without spending money at the garden center. This is a great choice for prolific annuals and vegetables.

I’m not going to go into great detail about sexual propagation in this post, so start here if you want to learn how to grow seeds.

Asexual Propagation In Plants

Asexual propagation uses already growing plants to create a separate “cloned” baby. Plants have different parts, like stems, leaves, offshoots, or bulbs, that are easy to grow for a fresh, new start.

• Propagating cuttings – Taking precise cuttings from the leaves, stems, or stolons (aka shoots, plantlets, or runners), you can get them to grow their own roots, and eventually mature into a full-sized specimen.

• By layering – In some cases, you can root stems while they are still attached to the mother plant, without severing them first. This way the new start still receives nutrients while it forms its own root system.

• Propagating by division – Some plants form bulbs, corms, tubers, rhizomes, or offsets (aka babies, suckers, or pups). You can divide these up to multiply them.

From Cuttings

• Sweet potato vine
• Mint
• Begonia
• Coleus
• Lavender
• Burrow’s tail
• African violet
• Jade plant
• Holiday cactus (Christmas or Thanksgiving)
• Kalanchoe
• Spider Plant
• Ajuga
• Plumeria
• Pothos
• String of hearts
• Wandering jew

By Division

• Aloe vera
• Agave
• Haworthia
• Sempervivum (Hens & Chicks)
• Bananas
• Bromeliad

Basic Plant Propagation Equipment & Supplies

Before you can propagate plants, you will need a few supplies. Don’t worry, you won’t need a bunch of expensive equipment to get started.

Heck, you probably already have some of this stuff at home. You can see a more detailed list here… Plant Propagation Tools & Equipment. But I’ll give you a quick list of the basic things you’ll need…

• Propagation soil – I make my own using a mix of perlite, vermiculite, and potting soil – but a nice seed starting mix will work too.

• A container – This can be a fancy propagation chamber, a pot with a clear plastic bag, or you could try to make your own DIY propagation box.

• Rooting hormone – To make it faster and easier to root slips and pieces, I highly recommend using rooting hormone. It’s inexpensive to buy, and totally worth it to increase your success rate.

• A cutting tool – For taking cuttings you’ll need to use a sharp, sterile pair of clippers, micro snips, bonsai shears, or a knife.

• Bottom heat (optional) – Using a heat mat can help the cuttings root faster.

Propagating Plants By Division

Many plants make it easy for you to multiply them from the new growth (known as babies or pups) they regularly produce from their roots. All it takes to divide them is a delicate touch, and some patience.

• Step 1: Carefully slide the entire rootball out of the pot.
• Step 2: Brush the soil away from the base of the pup that you want to remove to make sure it has roots of its own.
• Step 3: Gently tease them apart, slowly untangling the roots of the pup from those of the mother plant. Take care not to break any of the baby’s roots.
• Step 4: Use a sharp pair of clippers to sever the connection, and remove the pup from the mother.
• Step 5: Pot up the baby at the same depth it was growing in the original container.

Rooting Plant Cuttings

Rooting plant cuttings is where propagation becomes really comprehensive. There are a lot of varieties that you can grow from severed stems or leaves without having to wait for seeds and sprouting.

• Step 1: Dip the base of the stem or leaf in rooting hormone before sticking it into the medium.
• Step 2: Keep the rooting medium moist but not soggy, and never allow it to dry out completely.
• Step 3: Place the cuttings in a spot where they’ll be out of direct sunlight. An area near a sunny window inside the house is perfect. Outside, put them in the shade.
• Step 4: Cuttings will root faster in higher humidity. You can mist them regularly, or put a humidifier in the room to raise the moisture level.
• Step 5: Use bottom heat to facilitate the rooting process. In the winter, you can place your cuttings on a heat mat or near a vent (be careful, because the air from the heat vent will cause the soil to dry out faster).
• Step 6: New growth is usually the first sign that a cutting has rooted. Once that happens, gently brush the medium away from the base to check for roots.
• Step 7: Pot up the rooted slip into its own container. Place it at the same depth it was growing in the propagation tray.

Air Layering

Rather than dealing with severed cuttings, many times you can root the stems while they are still attached to the mother. Sometimes plants will air layer themselves, but we can help them by following these steps.

• Step 1: Carefully make a slice in the stem with a sharp knife to make a wound.
• Step 2: Prop the wound open using a small piece of wood or plastic, or with a toothpick.
• Step 3 (optional): Dust the cut part of the stem with rooting hormone to speed things up, and give you a better chance of success.
• Step 4: Wrap the cut section of the stem with damp sphagnum moss.
• Step 5: Cover the moss with plastic wrap or use a Root Pod to keep it in place.
• Step 6: Tie both ends of the plastic to secure it to the stem, and hold in the moisture.
• Step 7: Once you see new roots growing out of the moss, sever the stem just below the roots, and pot up your new plant.

Compound Or Tip Layering

Many plants will naturally form roots at the point where their stems touch the soil. By burying the stem, we can encourage the plant to propagate itself. Then come back to cut and transplant the new start later on.

• Step 1: Carefully bend the stem so that it’s touching the dirt.
• Step 2: Dig a shallow hole at the point where the stem touches the soil.
• Step 3 (optional): Make a small wound in the stem with a sharp pair of clippers.
• Step 4 (optional): Dust the wound with rooting hormone to help speed up the process.
• Step 5: Cover the part of the stem that is in the hole with soil. If the stem won’t stay put, you can tack it down with a paperclip that’s been bent into an upside down U shape.
• Step 6: Moisten the soil, and don’t allow it to dry completely.
• Step 7: When the buried stem has formed roots, then you can remove it from the mother plant, and repot it.