Growth Happening Under the Surface

 We are two weeks away from Spring here in Aotearoa and despite August traditionally being the worst weather of the year around here, today it just feels like Spring is in the air. All the flowers blooming in my garden are yellow. Daffodils, yellow freesia, and my tiny yellow roses. I've spent as much time as I could in the garden in the past few days, as the weather has been mild and so pleasant. I know it's a trick; we will get another cold snap or two before its all over. But I'm going to soak up the Spring-ness in the garden every chance I get, and enjoy it while it lasts.

I was reminded today that 11 years ago on this day we had an incredibly rare event for the area - it snowed. I'm thankful it is not snowing today. I have been working my way through the rest of my fruit pruning - something I should have really sorted last month. Now I'm just hoping to get through it before its too late. I found flower buds on one of my feijoa today when I was pruning. My deciduous trees will be waking up and unfurling all their fat, tightly curled up leaf buds soon. I got the fig to a more decent state today. It needed LOTS of pruning when we got here three  years ago, so I've been going slow, trying not to do too much all at once. I looked into how to propagate fig from cuttings, as I know my Dad would like one. It turns out that figs sprout side shoots off of their roots that are basically separate trees. If you simply grab and pull, some of them will come out with their roots intact. I gave this a go, with mixed results. Some of them came off with no roots. Some of them were too rooted to pull out like this. But I got three with roots attached. I then pruned them back so the reduced root system could cope with the seedling it was supplying, and planted them out in little pots. 

Cuttings like this can be a lot of fun to try your hand at if you are not too attached to the results. I usually do several cuttings at once in the hope that at least one of them will work out. Cuttings don't need a lot of sun as they have few or no leaves (and normally no roots either), and they don't need frequent watering for the same reason. But they do need their soil kept moist, so it's great to find them a shady spot where they won't need much watering and won't dry out in the sun. The trick is to find a spot that meets this criteria but isn't so far off the beaten path in  your garden that you will forget about it. Though this time of year, when its so cold and wet, I have often forgotten about cuttings under a tree somewhere out of the way and had them surprise me in Spring, when I discover they have survived and are starting to grow. I stuck these under the massive lemonwood tree that is right next to the path to the back garden. Hopefully I will remember to keep an eye on them. 

In fact this is a great time of year for cuttings. With anything  you are pruning,  you could take a few extra minutes to cut a promising young branch and stick it into a small pot or a jar of water in the window sill. Spring is right around the corner, and that's when cuttings tend to take off. The method I learned goes like this:

1) Identify a good branch. Find a young branch, something that looks like recent growth. How to spot this varies, but generally these will be greener, more flexible, and very healthy looking. If you're not sure, though, just grab some that look good and have a go. Cuttings are always a bit of a gamble, but it doesn't take much effort to start them, and its so cool when you do manage to grow a whole new plant from just a little twig.

2) Prune. Now cut your branch just below a growing node, this is where new roots will form. Sometimes they also form off the cut end itself. Where to cut the branch off, I can't really say, but it should include at least a few growing nodes. Now cut all the leaves off the lower two thirds of the cutting. Be ruthless about this - our cutting has no roots, so it can't cope with too many leaves! Then nip out the growing point at the end. Those teeny tiny leaves just barely forming on the end? Just pinch out gently with your fingernails. It sounds mean, but it's really helpful. The the cutting will respond by stalling its leaf growth for a bit, focusing more on root growth. 

3) Plant. If you're lazy like me, just plant your cutting into a little pot, like the kind plants come in at the garden centre, water, and wait. Plant with one third of your cutting under the soil. Set in a shady spot and water enough to keep the soil moist. When you see new growth, that's usually a sign that roots are forming. Once you've got a decent amount of growth it can be planted out. 

4) OR start in water - plant out later. If you've got a bit more patience or just want to baby your cuttings more, you can start them in a jar of water. I do some cuttings this way, as I've found certain types of plants do better when started in water. I put them on the kitchen window sill where I will see them every day and notice if I need to top up their water. You will have the joy of watching the roots form, and it's pretty cool to watch them grow. Once you have decent root growth you can plant them out into pots. Now you have the peace of mind that, while your little cutting might not look like much up top, you know growth is happening under the surface.

This is a time of planning and dreaming for the gardener, a time of setting little things up and imaging how they might pay off later. The cutting that might grow into a beautiful new plant. The pruned tree, bare and sparse, waiting for its moment to spread out new branches and bear fruit. 

P.S. I wrote most of this on Monday, and there has been a whole lot of rain since then, but warm and so still feeling very like Spring. It is not so conducive to outdoor activities, which makes a great time for garden planning. Check out this post from two years ago for some details on my planning process.