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ALMOST BEEKEEPING - RELATED TOPICS => FARMING & COUNTRY LIFE => Topic started by: GSF on August 16, 2013, 11:05:16 pm

Title: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: GSF on August 16, 2013, 11:05:16 pm
A little back ground on me. My grandparents raised me and I'm living in the house I was raised up in. My grandmother's mother lived with us too. (long life women). When the year turned 1900 my great grand mother was 18.

So as I grew older I begin to regret all the opportunities I missed to learn depression era survival skills. Also the things my grandfather had planted around here started disappearing/dying. I moved back home in 1989. Started remodeling, stopped remodeling, headed out to the Persian gulf war, returned. Anyway we have some awesome grape and scuppernongs vines that are fading away. Since no professor (yes college teaching plant smart professors) could ID them for me I knew the only way to keep them going was to root them.

Forgo pruning until the runners/vines can touch the ground. Then dig a hole around 3 to 5 inches deep and bury several inches of the vine. Make sure it don't get bone dry.  Keep the end of the runner up off the ground. Take something and damage/scrape the bark between the hole and the mother plant. As time progresses say about every month in the summer damage it a little more. What this does is it signals the vine that it's not getting what it needs from the main branch. Therefore it will start sending roots down in the soil to make up the difference.(I think that's why) After a growing season dig the plants up and put them in large containers until they can get on their feet - so to  speak. I done that this spring. Give them some sun but not all day sun. Don't let the containers dry out either. I just transplanted about six or seven of them last week and they are doing fine.

FIGS; I took some cuttings and stuck them in the soil last winter. I had two out of five root and take off. I did put rootone on the cuttings. I put at least two buds in the ground and left two buds above ground. Again I don't know the name of these figs but I do know the taste!
Title: Re: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: BlueBee on August 17, 2013, 03:33:58 am
Your grape approach is called layering (as you probably know).  There are lots of way to propagate plants, some respond better to one method than another.  I haven’t propagated grapes, but I have propagated lots of other plants mostly with intermittent mist.  Thousands and thousands of cuttings.  If you just want a few copies, then layering works fine, if you want thousands, then you need a different method. 

There are so many hybrids of grapes, how do you think a college professor would know exactly what you have?  It would likely require a DNA comparison to know for sure.

Michael Dirr (now at UofG) is a good source for plant IDs and propagation methods.  He's written lots of books on the subjects.
Title: Re: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: GSF on August 17, 2013, 07:52:01 am
I'm familiar with the misting approach but that's a little beyond my reach/need. There's an old saying I use to much; "Simple things for simple minds" To me it's just fascinating to know I have taken a plant/stem and caused it to root.
Title: Re: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: Vance G on August 17, 2013, 12:26:06 pm
Is that the Dirr that wrote Woody Landscape plants?  I lost the book to a former son-in-law who never returned it so that might not be the exact title.  That book was a good starting point back when I made my beans as a gardener/plantscaper. 
Title: Re: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: Joe D on August 17, 2013, 10:22:37 pm
I have the old brown turkey figs.  Great fresh and in preserves.  They have plenty of little ones that sprout next to the old tree.  I just take a grubbing hoe and get some, then plant where ever.  Good luck with your heirlooms.



Joe
Title: Re: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: BlueBee on August 18, 2013, 01:23:38 am
Is that the Dirr that wrote Woody Landscape plants? 
Yep, that's the guy!

The title is actually "The Manual of Woody Landscape Plants".  Often referred to as the tree bible in the nursery trade.  Talks about how to ID plants (or narrow it down), growing conditions, a list of various cultivars, and basic propagation info.
Title: Re: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: KD4MOJ on August 19, 2013, 02:38:14 pm
We have grapevines but no grapes. Actually around here the vines are more like Kudzu.... fast growing and hard to control.

...DOUG
KD4MOJ
Title: Re: Propagating (rooting) plants
Post by: GSF on August 19, 2013, 03:36:16 pm
I haven't looked Doug, but do you think it's a lack of chill hours? I don't even know if grapes need chill hours, I know apples & peaches do.