I have some hellebore clones I would like to propagate.

In college, we propagat3ed an African Violet by inserting a leaf into a media-filled petri dish and then left it out on the lab counter: we could watch the development of its roots from underneath the petri dish.

Does anyone have a link to instructions to do this. . make the media. . .etc?

This site suggests propagating hellebores using root division. Just whack a clump in half at root level (well, they describe a gentle way of doing that).

http://gardenofeaden.blogspot....

Apparently you can also raise them from seed: either very fresh seed, or deal with the dormancy:

"sow them when they are as fresh as possible. Once the seeds have been around for a few weeks their germination rate will begin to deteriorate, but leave it for a couple of months and the seed coat hardens requiring you to wait for its natural dormancy period to finish."

But won't many purchased plants be hybrids or clones that won't come true from seed?

The site seems to deliberately ignore that issue:

"Helleborus X sternii .
This hybrid is a cross between Helleborus argutifolius and Helleborus lividus. Once again this variety is best propagated by seed."

Maybe they mean it was "hybridized [u]and then genetically stabilized through inbreeding and selection", becoming an OP variety derived from a hybrid cross, But they didn't say that. It sounds more like "why don;t you go propagate a hybrid from seed and then re-discover F2 variability."

my sterile hellebores are little: this will be there first time blooming. I didn't read the catalog carefully enough before ordering them, so wound up with about 3 sterile clones! They won't be big enough to divide safely for at least another year or two: I'm impatient!

Besides, I want a couple of two of them.......NOW!

I hear you, Bet!

Just because no one else does it with cuttings doesn't mean you can't try!

Was this the plant that I read "has no stems", just leaves and petioles growing out of the rhizomes?

I guess "no stems" would make stem cuttings a tough proposition.

I think I have a book at home I can look into. But that book loves to give instructions like: "Do these 10 things to the plant in fall, ... then, come spring, do these 5 things ... then NEXT spring, divide the clump".

for looking in your book

re book's instructions:

I wish I were exaggerating! But it was all good advice for someone with many acres and unlimi8ted time to create hundreds of salable items with minimum cost ... but maximum waiting between steps.

I remember the word "stooling". And maybe "crowning".

But I'm still digging for the book.

Perhaps double-digging.

Not Hellebore but my tissue culture play , it's February , it's cold again ,, I get Bored ,, Bad word that is ,,
The reason for here ,, still looking for a good homemade tissue culture mixture myself .

Jim, I'm glad you bumped this thread because I couldn't find it!

I found my book, "Plant Propagation" by Philip McMillan Browse (1979).

However, all it had to say about hellebores was the Index entry for Helleborus:
- alpine - - pages 24 & 50-51
- herbaceous perennial - - page 26.

Page 24 - - "alpine" seeds - like winter sowing with no cover except a layer of grit

Page 26 - - starting plants from seeds in flats, then "pricking out" to pots

Pages 50 & 51 - - dividing clumps - root division

I took notes from pages 50 & 51. I do NOT know how apt this general advice is for hellebores, specifically. But here are my notes for "root division" in general, especially for herbaceous perennials with a relatively loose crown and fibrous roots .

I hope someone with hellebore experience will contradict any of this that is NOT suitable for multiplying hellebores.

- - - - - - - -

The best time to divide many such plants is usually right after flowering because
this is when new vegetative shoots are being produced AND the new root system is developing. (VERY late-flowering plants might be divided the next spring)

Lift the WHOLE plant or clump with a garden fork or shovel, damaging as few roots as practical.

OPTIONALLY, shake the soil off roots and WASH THE ROOTS.
This is for your convenience during division. If you're sending the division to someone else, this is your chance to remove 99% of potential soil-born pathogens, pests and eggs.

Cut the stems short: shorten all long stems and/or remove leaves to reduce water needs after re-planting, especially in summer and dry climates.

From the periphery of the crown or clump, break off pieces with at least one EYE, with several stems and roots.
(An eye is a bud. ???)
The center of the crown often becomes woody after 2-3 years, and produces fewer shoots and has less vigor. Discard any woody center.

Take divisions "of a suitable size for re-establishing a new crown".
(?? Several stems each ??)
Tease them apart.
Pull them apart.
Cut tough clumps with a clean sharp knife, cutting downwards.
(Serrated knife? Saw? Reciprocating saw?)

Replant at once.
Firm the soil.
Water well. Pamper until established (shelter from sun & drying wind, keep moist, shade?)
Mulch.
Keep it weeded until established!

@RickCorey I've been cruising the 'Net while waiting for you to find that book. I won't show the links for companies which sell the specialized media etc. but here are a few of the informative links (specific to hellebores). I'm still looking for further explanations, like what are explants and how might one get hellebore meristems WITHOUT destroying the one-and-only growing plant I have??

http://tigerprints.clemson.edu... (experiments, with Materials & Methods & Results, etc)
http://link.springer.com/proto... (a book, with hellebore-specific protocols. . supposedly. . .for about 50 bucks)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pu... (an abstract, to lead to another scientific article /experiments)

thus far, the info I've gleaned:
MS media, modified
MES buffer recomended
possibly fortified with antifungal and/or antibacterial agents
(for scientific, lab-type cloning: controlled atmosphere & humidity)

**where's the emoticon for brain-weary??

I've gone this far in talking about what I know very little about, so I'll keep going ...
if you read technical articles, they are only going to give very technical advice.

Unless they say things like this:
- - - - "hellebores are MUCH harder to divide than other plants, so you HAVE TO jump through all these hoops"
... maybe there is little need for the fancy media and techniques.

Are those articles talking about sterile tissue culture cloning? Then yes, there are hoops galore.

But if the plant can by propagated by division, it might be as easy as "pull it, cut it, re-plant it".

I'll go read those links now, if IT at work will let me.

Yeah, the first one is about tissue culture:

http://tigerprints.clemson.edu...

"Hellebores (Helleborus spp.) are winter-­‐flowering ornamental plants that are difficult to propagate in tissue culture."

"Helleborus plants reproduce both sexually by seed and vegetatively by rhizomes in nature. Hellebores are most commonly propagated by seed, due to prolific seed production and slow division rates in nature and commercial production. Interspecific hybrids such as the plants included in this study, however, often produce little or no seed. Additionally, the hybrid nature of these plants will result in seed that does not breed true (Burrell and Tyler 2006; Beruto et al. 2013). Due to the slow nature of in vivo propagation methods, the best-­‐quality hellebore plants, including rare interspecific hybrids, are often prohibitively expensive. Because commercialization of these cultivars is dependent on their propagation, high division rates may be possible using a suitable tissue culture method."

So is the book, and the third link seems to be the same. Ouch!

Good luck! They say that TC is also difficult - and those would be TC scientists saying it is hard!

I'm following along ,, only learning a few things ,

Rick , I have lost more threads in the past than I have hairs anymore ,

@RickCorey "hard"

success rate (for professionals using sterile TC in laboratory setting) is a whapping 1.something to 2.something
the time interval (from first starting TC until the first whispy roots appear) is 10-15 MONTHS!!

So. . . by the time I successfulkly got beginning roots on one clone. . . me widdle clone-in-the-ground would have its first rhizome, for making another plant!! It would still be too little to survive division for yet ANOTHER year.

Oh, well. . . I have nothing but time. .

Aside from TC being another hobby to occupy me, it appeals to me on another level: I miss being in the lab, developing protocols, trouble-shooting. .

it's not Hellebore , but one for one with a Fargesia Root
it's a cheat as a small live root piece was used ,,
Only hey , plants aren't sports or Law , any cheat in my favor I will take Gladly

BetNC said:@RickCorey "hard"
...
It would still be too little to survive division for yet ANOTHER year.
...
I miss being in the lab, developing protocols, trouble-shooting. .

I didn't understand at first, but now I do. Good luck with the TC! It sounds like you have all the experience you need to take on that challenge.

I hope you find an efficient TC process for hellebores, get your results published, patent the process, and get rich on it!

Jim,
>> a Fargesia Root

I love my little F. rufa, and I'm about to divide my clump (one of these years). I think I'll put some in pots for giving away, and plant a few more clumps in shady areas of my yard.

Rick I was playing around all these yrs , and The big "trick " is the PH , Always told in info , this plant like this , and this one that ,, Well , outside light is the "Biggie "

The 5.5 to 5.8 acidic in the tissue culture is the Difficult ,, Most plants , all plants , starting out , react well to that , yrs and yrs I thought that or was told that was impossible ,
I take little roots and try that ,, I cheat the intellect ,, I am not that skilled , only Hometime tricky ,..
The results were good when I remembered how .. All the seeds people would tell me were no good , grew okay for me ,
I am getting ready to try again ,, My best was a petrified Siberian oat grass seed I found as a rock ,, Been a long time since that ..

This is done during and as What the info says is entirely wrong for doing this ,

That does sound pretty acid, but the only TC I ever did was with mammalian cells, mostly mouse tumors. I just followed the cookbook.

Rooting cuttings I've only succeeded with ONCE ... and that one has yet to be put into soil.

Even dividing clumps of roots, I'm a novice.

Rick . I don't want to ask this lol ," Mouse tumors " referring to a purpose ?
Basis of early organ replication , or regrowth I have heard of ,, and No ,,,Not the South Park version ,, he , he ,,
1960's I was doing cell investigations of carbon saline with RNA , How to activate and identify ancient DNA .. one step ,,,

Just tissue culture for cancer research. Some standard tumor lines we grew in the mice, some on plastic. The doc in that lab was researching different immunological ways to suppress tumors, and testing on mice is nicer than testing on humans.

And you can fit more mice into each cage!

>> How to activate and identify ancient DNA

Cool! Ancient human DNA, bacterial DNA, or something in-between?

I keep thinking that the Archea may have migrated as spore fragments from other star systems, the earth had life so soon after cooling. I wish we could discover some off-planet life so we could compare biochemistry, and then compare DNA if they have DNA.