Rose Of Sharon Propagation Schedule

Irene Pawlowski:

Hi, I’m Irene and we’re going to talk about Althea’s Rose of Sharon and how to take care of it from now to fall. So first of all, what I’m going to show you is I’m going to take a clipping of this particular rose of Sharon. It’s a white blooming one, and whenever you take a clipping, you have a hardwood, a semi-hardwood, and a softwood or very mushy soft. And the way you can tell is a hardwood will not bend as easily where your semi-hardwood is very flexible and the top is not at all. So it’s always best to take a cut in either your hardwood or your softwood. And you want to have at least four nodes, like this is 1, 2, 3, 4, and you cut it right above the fourth node at an angle. And before you cut, you make sure your tools are sterilized, wiping them with the Clorox, and you cut it just like that.

And then what you do, after you cut it, you make sure also that you have four nodes on here. So you count 1, 2, 3, and you cut off the top. You have to have at least four nodes on it and you take all the leaves off and just leave, maybe leave a leaf of two and you can cut them in half, just so you don’t drain it. And then normally you would shave it a little bit like this, and you would dip it in a Bontone hormone powder or liquid. And after you do it, you have a little four-inch planter and have a medium, a plant potting medium that’s mostly moss and perlite. After you stick it and put it like this and water it in, and you got your planting.

And after so many weeks, this is what it comes up to. It roots on the very bottom tip. And when it gets tall like this, or short, depending on the size of the cutting that you put in, then you need to upgrade it, because then it gets root bound. So the way you want to check on that is you take your pot, flip it up, and you could see the roots already starting to form nicely here. So what you want to do is you want to upgrade it to a little larger pot so that it could start expanding and growing, and then you can be able to maintain it. And the best way to do that, whenever you’re planting anything, do not go past what it originally has grown. So you empty it out of this pot. This is one, as you can see, has really root bound nicely.

So what you need to do, get one a little bit bigger. We use in here Nature’s Way soil medium for potting plants, fill it up about halfway. I like to use micro life sprinkle in here. It will not burn the roots. And then take and tease the bottom a little bit. Use a screwdriver or pencil and tease it just a little bit. If the roots get really bad in a way, it don’t hurt to clip them, but you don’t want to squash them and put them in a pot, maybe an inch lower than what the pot is right now, because you can see the roots right here on top. And then just add the soil around it. And water it in real well. And then it can stay in this pot until about September is a good time to put it in your ground and water it in real well. Again, do not go past where you have it and let it acclimate and get it ready for fall.