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THECOMMERCIAL GREENHOUSEGROWER • MARCH 2017
Rooting tips for
long-distance cuttings
German research onmanaging temperature and light when
rooting crops such as pelargoniums could help growers
improve their resultswith bought-in cuttings.
UweDruege, a researcher at the Institute of Vegetable and
Ornamental Crops, explained his latest results at AHDB
Horticulture’s softwood propagationworkshop in February,
alongwith presentations fromUK growers on propagation
management and fromUK researchers on findings from
AHDB-fundedprojects.
“Members of theAHDB nursery stock panel heard about Dr
Druege’swork and that was really the inspiration for bringing
together thisworkshop,” said the panel’s chairmanMartin
Emmett.
Dr Druege told growers that sugar and nitrogen levels in
the cuttingwere crucial for good rooting and that these can
be influenced by temperature and light – not only during
propagation but during transport and storage, too, and even
before the cutting has been taken from the stock plant.
“If you buy in cuttings fromAfrica, for example, they have
started inwarm bright conditions. Then they are stored and
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transported in the cool anddark, and finally you root them here
in Europewhere light intensity is lower thanwhere they came
from,” he said. “We have been looking at how those conditions
affect the physiology of the cuttings, and hence their ability to
survive and root.”
Oneway to improve rooting of cuttings after being stored and
transportedwould be to raise light levels during propagation,
to increase photosynthesis andboost depleted sugar levels,
he said. “Alternatively, lowering the air temperature, to around
10�C, whilemaintaining bottom heat, enhances photosynthesis
under lower light conditions, replenishes carbohydrate levels in
the cutting and improves rooting,” he said.
A trial fundedby AHDB at theBedding andPot Plant Centre
last year looked at treatments growers could apply if bought-in
cuttings had deteriorated in transit. Dips intoRhizopon rooting
hormone, the fungicideSignum, the biofungicideSerenade
ASO and the silicone-basedwetting agent Omex SW7 all
helped to improve root development comparedwith cuttings
that hadbeen stuck untreated, having arrived in poor condition
after five days in transit fromKenya, saidRSKADAS consultant
and theCentre’s project leader, Jill England.
Cuttingswhich hadbeen treatedwith plainwater also did
better than the ‘untreated’ ones, suggesting that at least part of
the effect was simply due to rehydration, she added.
