(RELAXED GUITAR MUSIC)
Propagating your own plants I reckon
is one of the most joyous and rewarding things
you can do in the garden.
Today, I want to show you some of the simplest techniques to get started.
First up, seeds.
And I grow stacks of them.
There are a few basic rules to sowing seeds
that can be applied fairly generally.
First one is the mix that you're going to use.
Now, I use just a really regular potting mix
but I sieve it to ensure that it's got nice fine particles
that then really make contact with that seed.
The second rule is that you sow the seed
about twice as deep as it is wide.
So a big seed like that, you make a good hole.
You actually drop it right in and then cover it over.
Now the other great thing about growing from seed
is that you can increase the diversity of plants in the garden.
There are some things that you can't buy at the nursery.
Even something as basic as a lettuce,
at the nursery you might find four or five different varieties,
but when it comes to seed, you can go absolutely crazy.
There are dozens and dozens to try.
I have a bit of a lettuce fetish, to be honest.
I love them, and so I have a few favourites
but I'm always trying something new as well,
and I do it from seed.
Now, when it comes to size of something like lettuce,
they are really tiny seeds
and it would be absolutely impossible
to plant that at twice the depth of its width.
So instead, you just go on the surface
and then just the tiniest sieve of fine mix to lightly cover.
And then I just firm them down.
They both go into the nursery, get a water and they'll be up in no time.
It is a relatively simple act to put a seed in a pot of dirt
and they have everything they need to germinate,
but the next stage is actually where you need to pay a bit of attention
and give them some TLC.
Now, once those first leaves emerge, the little round leaves there -
they're the seed leaves that contained in the seed -
you're up and running,
but when those next leaves emerge,
that's when you need to move them out of those pots
in a technique called pricking out.
Just gently levering those first out
to see if there are roots.
It's quite a good little root system there,
so I'm confident that they're ready to be pricked out.
It is important to be very gentle with them.
Just backfill around, pop them in a really sheltered spot,
I'll water them, nice bit of sun and hopefully in about four or six weeks,
they'll be absolutely bursting to get out into the garden.
Growing from seed produces a genetically diverse offspring.
But cuttings, they give you an exact clone of the plant.
Something like a fuchsia is a great thing to start with
'cause they root really, really easily,
but you can propagate plants from cuttings
at different times of the year.
You just need to get different material.
In spring, you can use really soft-tip growth,
which will form roots very quickly
if kept in a moist and humid environment.
As summer approaches and into autumn,
you're using much more mature semi-hard wood,
which is further down the plant.
In winter, you can take hardwood cuttings,
even from completely dormant deciduous species.
Now, they will take longer to form roots but they take less care
because of that cooler environment.
The trick is just to learn a little bit about that plant
that you want to grow and the best time to take a cutting.
If you want something from a friend's garden - and they'll let you -
take a really generous piece, at least 10cm long.
And if you've got a distance to travel,
wrap it in wet newspaper to keep it moist.
Rosemary is actually a fantastic plant
to start practising your cuttings on because it roots really very easily.
This might look like regular rosemary to you,
but to me it is a really special plant.
I took cuttings of a plant growing in a garden I rented
with a really dear friend about 10 years ago.
And finally she's bought a new house.
I wanna propagate some of this
so I can give it to her for her own garden.
For real success with cuttings,
it is worth using a custom mix
which holds a lot of moisture but also a lot of oxygen.
So I mix about 50% perlite in with potting mix.
And the perlite is like a magical ingredient, really.
It holds both oxygen and moisture at the same time.
So when you're preparing your cuttings -
and you'll get lots from a piece like this -
you need to just strip it back
and recut nice and sharp right under a leaf node.
So where the leaves come from - when they go under the soil,
that's where the roots will come from as well.
And then you remove most of that lower foliage.
I usually work on about a two-third, one-third rule.
Live about a third on top.
And then I'll often even snip that in half
to stop too much moisture coming out of that little cutting.
So this will form roots fairly easily.
They're very, very easy to strike.
But a way to improve your strike rate
is actually to use a little bit of a hormone.
So it's a plant hormone,
it helps to encourage those roots on the end of the cutting.
Some people even use honey.
And then a really important step
is to not just push that cutting into the soil
because you can damage the end.
Instead you use a dibber, a stick or a pencil.
You make a nice hole and you slip it all the way in.
And then firm that up.
And then repeat.
Water them in, of course.
But then you need to keep them warm and moist
until they form roots to take up moisture.
A plastic bag or an old milk bottle works a treat.
Make sure you lift it every now and then to release the humid air
and prevent any fungal infection.
One of the simplest ways to propagate plants
is to look for those plants that actually propagate themselves.
Clumping perennials, things like dianellas,
even artichokes, you can lift them up
and divide up those multiple plants and get lots of stuff for free.
Today I want to divide this little suckering perennial,
which is a basalt daisy, it's a local species.
And you can see how happy it is in this heavy clay basalt soil.
I reckon I want more of this
to spread right throughout the garden bed,
so I'm gonna divide some up today.
So you just need to look down at the base of the plant
and you can see there's multiple growing points,
so I'm just gonna look for a kind of natural junction
and carefully slide my knife in...
..and lever that out.
First thing I need to do to propagate more plants from this clump
is to remove all of these flowers and this excessive growth.
It takes a lot of energy to produce those
and I want to remove them completely.
So I'm just going to grab it - it's a bit brutal - and take that off.
Now I can actually separate out some of these plants.
It's quite obvious where the little individual plants are.
I'm just gonna sort of tease apart the clump.
You could wash it off so you can see the roots really clearly
but I think I'll be able to just snip out the different individuals.
So you can see that that little stem is a really robust plant.
Lots of roots and a very healthy growing tip.
So I'm gonna pot all of these up,
and from one clump, I'm gonna come out with maybe a dozen plants
that can be spread throughout the garden.
In as little as a few weeks,
these little divisions will actually have a nice full root system.
And when you see some roots down in those drainage holes,
you know it's time to get them back out into the garden.
Really, I reckon propagating your own plants
is so rewarding.
Not only do you get lots of new and interesting plants for almost free,
you also can bring other people's gardens into yours
and have some extra stuff to give away.
So go on, get propping!