Thanks, Linda! I'm trying to root Incense and just put a few cuttings into a jar of water. Is that one that would do better in soil?

I'm experimenting with trying to root some daphne cuttings from a hugely overgrown shrub of mine. I have them in a glass of water with a twig from a pussywillow. I split the twig, as well as the two small green growths from the daphne. These prunings would otherwise have been tossed, so I figured I'd give it a try, knowing how temperamental daphne can be.

I'll post whether I succeed or not!

You have a "hugely overgrown shrub" of daphne? Wow! You must be in 7th heaven!! I can only imagine the fragrance in mid-late winter. What a treat that must be.

Good luck. Looking forward to your report.

Shoe(edited for spelling)

I agree with Shoe! you must be in heaven when that blooms. I got some cuttings from my Mom this year and tried to root them in a forsythe pot. They looked beautiful and then suddenly began dying 1 at a time. I lost them all. I will have to wait until next year to try again.

I'm a complete novice to rooting stem cuttings, and also this is the first year I've gotten salvia to grow from seeds and survive into the garden.

Is it plausible that I could take stem cuttings from my annual Salvias, root them in water, transfer gradually into 3" pots, and keep them indoors under florescent light until next Spring, then plant them back out?

I've done that with tomatoes. And petunias.

I've never tried salvias from cuttings. Rick, are you talking about salvias that are annuals (in your zone, at least), or perennial?

Karen

I was only wanting to "over winter" the annuals, since I can hope the perennials will come back in Zone 8 (I plan to mulch them).

The annuals might re-seed, but not all of then bloomed profusely, and the Lady In Red might not come back perfectly true from reseeding.

I was just curious. The annuals I've grown from seed are so easy to grow from seed that I wondered.

Karen

I guess, now that I have fast-enoguh-draining mix, they have become easy for me too ... but for 2-3 years I couldn't start any Salvia from seed, annual or perennial.

I think it also helped me a lot when i started pre-soaking salvia seed despite their small size.

You're almost certainly right: it HAS to be easier to start a whole extra tray of Salvias from seed, than to maintain even a few potted plants for months indoors under lights.

And next year I'll be smarter about pushing them from the trays into soil earlier.

annual salvia can be winter sowed outside.. even in my short growing season.. they bloom in no time.. might be an easier option anyway

I wintersow my annual salvia every year. This year, though, my volunteers were bigger than the wintersown ones at plant out time so I used the volunteers.

Karen

I'll probably keep trying that, but had 0% germination for all the salvia I tried WSing last winter.

That was my first year WSing, so I'm still learning.

It has worked well for me Rick. Feel free to ask questions on the seed forum and we'll see if anyone has suggestions for you.

Karen

I already have a pile of things to try differently, mainly from the Wintersowing Foirum in the old DG.

I had them germinate in my gravel driveway from the containers on my deck.. guess the seeds blew over there

>> I had them germinate in my gravel driveway

Given that Salvia like good drainage, they might like gravel better than my hard clay!

Although that doesn't explain why I used to kill them in seedling trays. It MIGHT hint that last year's WS tubs held too much water: I'm still learning to lighten my seedling and potting mix more and more.

The extra openness helped my indoor seeding so much, it might also do the trick for WSing.

Rick, what are you using for potting mix and what are you using to lighten it?

drainage is very important for WS'ing ... granted there is soil under the gravel.. but so darn compacted I was surprised to see something growing there.. don't even need to fight the grass trying to grow there.. it just doesn't ... when I tried to dig up the plants that started.. the driveway told me to take a hike.. so hard I couldn't even get a shovel in there.. bad news is the poor babies were run over when we had to move the vehicle parked there

I gave up long ago on mixes in bags, especially bags of opaque plastic so I can't see what I'm getting. Maybe I had a few bad expeirences with mixes that were mostly finely milled peat moss - I tend to overwater and haven't been able to break that habit. My first 2-3 years starting seeds drowned a lot of seeds!

Now I'm working off a batch of mix that started as about 10% commerical fine powdery milled peat (Miracle-Gro?) I gradually 'amended" it by adding 90% lighteners.

First, some coarse sand, which helped very little.

Then 20 Kg of #2 chicken grit, a big bag of coarse Perlite - big help.

At the same time, a big bag of coarse vermiculite: that may have helped open up more air space, but it held so much water that it may have hurt. And that vermiculite is probably breakintg back down into powder every time I dig into the bag of mix.

Finally I was turned on to shredded pine bark. I am now a pine bark groupie, and I sing its praises day and night.

My potting and sedling mixes are 70-85% screened pine bark, and 15-30% "everuthing else". When i finally work off all the milled peat moss blend, the only fines I will let in are the pine bark fines i can't easily screen out.

- - -

There are expensive double-screened pine bark products, if you know a good nursery wholesaler or want to pay online shipping charges.

You can start with orchid bark, but where I see that for sale, shredded $1 bills would be cheaper.

You can start with dirty, soggy, smelly, half-fermented no-name woody junky mulch from Home Depot for $3.50 per 2 cubic foot bag.

I start with "nice" or "beauty" pine bark mulch, medium grade, for $7-8 from a classy nursery. They either keep it dry, or sell it fast enoguh that it doesn;t moulder on the pallet. No wood or dirt. Less "powder". Many nice long strands, fibers and chips.

I screen out as much of the fine stuff as I can. Anything that can be forced through 1/4" mesh by shaking bouncing or rubbing is too fine, and that gets turned into into my outdoor raised bed soil, or mixed directly with raw clay as I convert clay to soil.

I pick out the bigger pieces by hand and by pouring it rapidly down a 1/2" mesh.

For starting seedlings I don't want big chunks, so it has to pass very easily through 1/2" mesh and I still pick out big pieces by hand.