Friday 29 March 2013

Taking cuttings at home

Another activity which we're doing to provide plants for the Annecy Gardens is taking cuttings. I bought as single plant of Brassica 'Creme Chantilly' at one of the RHS shows in London last October & immediately chopped it up into cuttings, so I now have four plants. This plant is an ornamental, but I'm sure one could use the leaves like kale. Because it is variegated, it will not come true from seed, so cuttings are necessary. I've found they take very easily.
Brassica 'Creme Chantilly'. This plant is from a cutting taken last October.  You can see flower buds on the top of it.



Cut with a sharp knife

After removing the flowerbuds, I've divided the stem into 3 cuttings



The cuttings are then inserted in a pot of gritty compost and then watered
The pot with the cuttings is placed in the greenhouse; the cuttings should root in about 4 weeks

2 comments:

Deborah Begley said...

Hello from Ireland :) I came across this great blog while googling for something entirely different! What an unexpected treat. This Kale looks really lovely. I grow the other variegated form Daubenton Panache and would really like to try this one as well. Would you be interested in selling or swapping a cutting with me?

Kind regards, Deborah

Deborah Begley said...

Hello from Ireland :) I came across this great blog while googling for something entirely different! What an unexpected treat. This Kale looks really lovely. I grow the other variegated form Daubenton Panache and would really like to try this one as well. Would you be interested in selling or swapping a cutting with me?

Kind regards, Deborah