Before this latest batch of suckers dry out.

I just picked them an hour ago.

How do I do this?

I have compost. I have DE. I have very old but probably okay Vermiculite. I have coarse Perlite. No peat, no coco coir.

Every time I have tried it, it has not gone well, I must be doing it wrong.

Sizes of suckers I picked range from 3-4" to 12".

I may have found the right word unintentionally, propogating seems to be the search term.

I just put them in water until they grow good roots, then plant them in dirt.

I place them in a glass of water until they form roots. Then they go into well drained fine grain potting soil.

okay thanks fellows

im seeing big suckers, strip most of the leaves, put in water on a sunny windowsill for a week.

The first youtube i watched uses mason jars.

Boy I thought you were supposed to do this in wet dirt, etc.

Ill get on this. They are all mixed up, by type, but that won't matter, they are all good.

I assume take off the tiny flower trusses?

edit
cloning, ah, that is the word I was looking for.

you CAN plant suckers directly in potting mix. carolyn has said so, and i imagine has done it.
i have the best luck putting them in water until you see bumps on the stem. they are white or
a light green. just as soon as i see roots start to poke out, i pot it up in potting soil. keep the soil
moist, not soaking wet, and in a somewhat shady spot for two or three days, and you are good to go.
the roots do not have to be large when you pot it up.


keith

zeuspaul wrote: ↑Sat Jul 27, 2024 9:03 pm I place them in a glass of water until they form roots. Then they go into well drained fine grain potting soil.

I have done it two ways, rooting hormone powder after wetting the stem and planting directly in the garden. 50% success rate this way. Now I use the water method (close to100% this way). Am a firm believer in the hormone powder, use it on all suckers, even in the water. Be sure that you have good healthy roots before planting the suckers.

Ok thanks and thanks.

I'm not sure where these will be going yet, and I'm hoping that the cuttings were high enough on the plants that they don't unseen blight already. My comm garden plants look way worse than before the rain started this month...

My back garden plants still look relatively free of blights. I'm trying to figure the reasons - there are at least 4 major differences between the gardens.

I plant them in damp soil (not wet) with shaded/filtered light. Sometimes I will root them right beneath the parent there in the garden. They root very easily, just don't place them in the direct sun until they have some roots on them.

Drying out can be a sign if many things. But if it’s within a few hours, then there’s probably not enough water to keep the plant upright.

In your situation with the resources that you have, I would probably do a set up where you fill a container with straight vermiculite and fill it to the top with some kind of nutrient solution(maybe mixing some compost in might work assuming there’s no diseases). This way you can keep the cuttings upright and have them develop roots without fussing around with balancing them in straight water. I would remove any leaves that are buried underneath and any flower trusses that are developing.

Usually I have a 100% success rate when I plant them in potting mix with a home made 70:30 of coconut coir:perlite. The coconut coir is first hydrated with fertilizer solution(usually 100ppm Nitrogen in the solution) just enough to be barely damp. Afterwards, the potting mix in the container gets a thorough watering of more fertilizer solution. Only the leaves of the cuttings in the soil will be removed and I leave the rest underneath a grow light.

warm and wet potting soil 18oz solo cup no drainage.
bag in a ziplock bag.
a translucent solo cup you can monitor root growth if the cutting doesn't rot on you.

I just stick them in a bucket of water (non translucent usually a black florist bucket) and leave them for a few days. Rooted up whether in the greenhouse or outdoors, didn't lose any leaves except what had to be removed from the lower stem, except if I left them in the water more than a week. Didn't remove flowers, some of them set fruits while still in the bucket. And made roots too. Potted up into the usual potting mix and well draining pot. You have to keep them watered, don't let them dry out for a week or so after potting up so the roots can adapt to the dirt.
It's not even impossible to root a stem with fruit on it, or keep them in water until the fruit ripen. Done this when major stems went down.

When I just use water they just rot.
Very temperature sensitive also.
Too cold and they rot.
Too hot and they saute'.
I root stems with green tomatoes all the time no BER.
Usually after a weed whacker accident.

I did it for the first time this spring when I broke the tips off two cherry tomatoes accidentally. So I had 8 inch tips with little leaves and I just stuck them in the 10 gallon grow bags in a shady corner protected from the wind. They did not get any direct light, but there was a nice amount of indirect light. I watered them every so often because they didn't die right away. To my delight, they recovered, grew and are both now 6 foot tall with immature fruit only 60 days later. Sounds like I luckily bumbled into basically doing it the way @MissS does.

Solo cup of wet vermiculite, 4 cuttings per cup. They have roots when you tug slightly upward and they don't slide out. The rooting powder is inexpensive and worth it, still works without it, maybe just a little slower.

Clean pruner. Minimal leaves. Optional, if you are multi-stemming like I am, preferably don't remove tiny suckers. Wet the branch, dip in root hormones. Plop right in wet potting mix. Water a little. Keep in shade.

Will update in 2 week.

*Make sure there are no fungus gnats or other pests your potting mix. When I was in Florida, there were more pests and the little worms in the soil eat the cuttings from the inside. So if this is a problem, use new potting mix and propagate them indoor.

Not that I have tried it, but the active ingredient in the powdered hormone can be found in the growing tips of the willow tree and extracted with water:
https://deepgreenpermaculture.com/2010/ ... low-water/

That's cool about the willow tree...I may know where to find one, but I'm not really in a willow area. I think I probably read something about that in a novel, that sounds familiar.

thanks for all the walkthroughs. I did the water that first night, set on windowsill facing backyard. I will need to check them over tomorrow afternoon.

With all the incoming.
I forgot about the outgoing. My brother told me that he said they looked good the other day. I didn't hear him, and I had forgot all about them. I noticed them this morning, and jus now again and had time for them. Refilled them once with water a week or more back, and now again 5 minutes ago. The pint was down to 1/2"...I guess I should get them out soon.

edit

Anyway.

I never have much luck/space/need for fall tomatoes. We'll see, I should have a spot for them. Any suggestions on changes from long season planting style? I guess the sunniest spot possible is a given. Florida weave? Cages, sprawl? I seem to remember limiting to one or two stems on a fall big beef, a few years back, and getting like 12 smallish tomatoes off it before they just sort of stopped growing. That was a CRW cage with stems clipped to the uprights. They got disease pretty quickly with the August plantout.