Interesting comments. Do you get enough cold weather where you are that the roses actually go dormant?

I've had good luck myself with a bucket of damp sand in full shade in the winter months.

Do you mist the stems, or do you keep the sand wet? I haven't propagated in that way, I still use the ziplock baggie method. Please explain how you keep them watered.

My area is just a little warmer than California. Sydney is near freezing but not freezing in coldest time of Winter (1 - 5C). And this period is only 1 month therefore roses go dormant for about 1 month only. They do slow down for the full 3 months of end of Autumn and end of Winter.

There is no need to water them. That's teh beauty of it. As they are mature cuttings, they do not need water until they start growing little leaves. That's why mixing 20% peat into sand will help to provide the required water. The cuttings would be able to absorb a little moisture from the medium. For Winter this is perfect. But for End of Summer, one must spray daily and keep in shade to avoid loss of water.

Thanks for posting your picture. I found a good spot in a raised sandy bed where I want to propagate some rose cuttings,but I never knew how close they could be stuck in. As they say, one picture is worth a thousand...

Thanks for the info, I am going to try this way of rooting.

This way even works well up north during the summer. I have a box of sand under a tree that I stick cuttings in everytime I prune something.

what kind of sand do you use? and can you do this in the house?

Fine play sand will keep more moisture. I add peatmoss in to store even more moisture. Any sand would allow air access to the base of the cutting which is vital for rooting to happens.

On the question of doing it in the house, I would say yes. However you will need something like 2 - 4 florescent tubes placed just 10cm above the cuttings. The young leaves won't produce enough photosynthesis to form callus quick enough. Under florescent light it's even worse. That's why doing it outside with 2 hours of early cool morning Sun (then bright shade all day) would be best. I would say that if you do it indoor, make sure you get 4 tubes of florescent lights plus making sure the cuttings are really mature as these have enough reserved energy stored into the wood to feed the young new growth for 5-6 weeks until the leaves are mature enough to do decent photosynthesis.

For people who do it outside in early Spring, if the climate is very mild without sudden change in temperature and wind, you can even speed up the process by spraying a little 1/2 strength soluble fertiliser on the new leaves. This will help to speed up top growth and callusing. However you would want to space the cuttings a bit apart so that they have enough room to grow.

Finally the question about repotting and how to nurse them to maturity. Repotting them is easy as one would throw the pot into a large bucket of water and shake off the sand to keep the roots intact. Then put them into pots or plant them into a garden bed. The best way I have discovered is to plant them into standard pots then plant the post into a huge mobile tub, kind of trolley so that you can move around the garden into best spots for various stage of maturity and climatic condition. Baby roses loves morning Sun and hate afternoon Sun ... I just grow them densely like vegetables, pick all the blooms for the kitchen within the first 8 months. Then it's very easy to lift them out of the big container as they are already in individual pots. By this time all the weak ones can be destroyed, I keep the best only and they would make fine bush roses in athe garden even though they are ownroot roses.

The wisdom of planting them in pots then plant pots in a larger pot is that baby roses need to live together so they protect one another by shading one another. Also planting the pots into a big container helps to protect the roots from Summer heat helping all of them to grow healthily together sharing same source of water and fertiliser. Then as they are in little pots pulling them out is easy without breaking their roots.

I find it's very nice to eventually remove all roses I bought and replace them by the ones I propagate myself. Out of the many I propagate, some of them are clear "leading horses" and they completely outgrow their parents.

Here is a link that might be useful: My roses

demaivn wrote:

"by spraying a little 1/2 strength soluble fertiliser on the new leaves. This will help to speed up top growth and callusing"

Could you explain "callusing"? What is it and why is it important?

Thanks!

Kimmie

The cuttings need to form callus at the base before they can root. Callus is the milk colour thing that form at a wound/cut on plants to heal the wound. It's formed by the flow of nutrients from the leaves backdown the stem through the veins in the cambium layer. This is where roots will grow at the base.

The only way to promote this creation of nutrient (sap flow) is to allow the leaves to perform photosynthesis well. This requires cool temperature, bright light, water and minerals. The spray of soluable fertiliser on the leaves provide water, nitrogen and minerals directlly to the photosynthesis process.

Be careful as this will create a big spur of growth which can drain on the reserve of energy in the canes. Also it will create big demand on water which is not available as the cuttings do not have roots. If you use misters, then it's not a worry about leaf burnt and lack of water.

After a few weeks. The have grown considerably but there are still no roots. The leaves need to mature, creating sap flow before roots will strike.

{{gwi:1242523}}

This is a tender moment. If care is not taken the cuttings will die as they exhaust the reserve energy and die. Also if the temperature warms up quickly they grow too fast and die quickly. They should stay in bright shade, cool temperature, get frequent spray of water.

In some areas like Sydney they also suffer the first attack of blackspot or some kind of fungus that causes them to lose new leaves. The leaves would turn a touch yellow nd all rapidly. To counter this problem I spray Triforine on the leaves. Other sprays with sulfur that soil the leaves will prevent proper photosynthesis making it much harder to root.

Some of them will die regardless. There is no reason except that the cuttings do not have enough energy in them. Just pull them out and throw away. But keeping them in the pot is also OK.

After they root, they won't suffer malnutrition as I include a layder of fertile soil deep down the bottom of the pot. The roots will travel down rapidly and take up that nutrient. So there is no rush to pot them out.

Oh my gosh what a sight, I can't wait to try this in late winter! Do you have any updated pics? Bet they look nice :)

Those are all the same rose, right? Or are they all different?

Andrea

They are all different. About 1/2 of them survived as we had a huge heat wave of 40+ degrees C for 3 days. So hot that all my rose blooms fried in the hot Sun and wind. The babies stay in shade but the wind did not spare them. That's why a bit of misting will really help in conditions like Australian Spring with temperature spikes that reach the height of Summer heat.

Last year I sat similar cuttings in my rooting machine that sprayed water on the pot. The survival rate was very high. This lazy method is not about high sucess rate. It's about high number of good baby roses at the end. As it's so easy to do it. You just stick all your Winter prunings in, and wait. If you get only a small percentage over hundreds of cuttings, you still end up with a large number.

I then move the cuttings into a temporary planting area where they sit densely like veggies in good soil. Only be best are kept as I thin the bed slowly to weed out the poor ones. The rest become very decent own root roses that can match with grafted ones from the shops.

One very good observation I have is about how planting many different roses densely actually help them to fight off diseases. My theory is that they root graft under the soil. So mutually the ones with superior disease resistance will help the poorer ones to fence off attack from Black Spot and Powdery Mildew. I now have one wheelbarrow full of assorted roses sitting in 1/2 Sun. And they are completely healthy while same roses standing alone having BS and PM problems.

You guys are in Northerm Hemisphere where it's the time to get ready for Winter rooting. Try this lazy method and you will be pleased next Spring. The best cuttings are those about 6 months to 1 year old. It's not good to use younger or older cuttings. These cuttings are young enough to root. And they also have enough energy to last 5-6 weeks of early Spring growth while waiting for roots to strike.

I rooted my first cuttings ever this fall, just used root tone and stuck them in a pot with play sand. I put 10 cuttings in and got 8 to take and transplanted them into bigger pots in 45 days after sticking them in the sand. They are all doing great. Talk about lazy!!! I would just add a little water every couple of days but probably didn't need it. Good idea to add peat moss to aid water retention. I will try that next time.

Patrick

My goodness, dmaivn, that's very similar to what I do! I wouldn't have even admitted to using this method if you haven't posted this thread - as it is the real lazy person's "there-is-nothing-to-lose-so-be-it" rooting method.

I use a 50:50 mixture of perlite and sterilised play sand because I find sand alone to be too heavy to carry around for my poor wonky back. I have a 25% strike rate. Not great, but I have got nothing to lose, as I would be throwing the materials from fall pruning away anyway. And as you mentioned, the mortality rate is highest when the cuttings start to shoot but haven't gone to roots yet. But it does depend on the variety. Mdm Alfred Carriere never fails to root. Multiflora, I find, strikes root very quickly, before the cuttings start to shoot. I suspect it depends on the maturity of the cuttings too.

I didn't read all the information about how and what you did. But looking at the picture that is exactly how I do alot of my extra left over cuttings that don't get the plastic baggy method. I have very good success doing it the same way as your picture.

I think folks in Nothern hemisphere get more sucess. We have wild temperature in Sydney. Even in early Spring, we have some days when the temperature reaches egg-frying level. Then it plunge back to late Winter time where you shake without warm clothes. The heat really hurt baby cuttings that haven't got feeder roots.

Are you using rooting hormone or are these results from simply sticking cuttings into the sand without any rooting hormone? Getting ready to try this myself.
Thanks!

How do you keep a record of which cutting is which rose ?

I tried this method late last fall. I did have some success, although not a very high percentage. I think they may have not had enough moisure. I placed them in a bright space on my back porch, so they never received any of the rain we have had in this area this winter. None of the named roses rooted, only the roses that I have no idea what the names are (is?).

I am going to try it again but put some kind of clear covering on the cuttings and see what happens.

The sand should have peat in it to keep water moisture. There is no need for rooting hormone because you will be rooting very mature cuttings over a period of 2 months. It's very cold so the root won't show up until the top growth starts. I don't think rooting hormone can stay active for that long underground knowing you would water it some times.

It's best to expose the pot to morning Sun. At the first sign of Spring the buds will grow. It's important that the canes much be thick to have enough reserve allowing the top leaves to grow, mature and produce enough sap flow for the base to start rooting.

In unstable climate where the temperature jumps on daily basis in Spring between late Winter and early summer heat (like Australia), one may need to prvenet direct Sun and must spray the cuttings on hot days.

This is about percentage. You would put down hundreds of cuttings to get a good number growing. But it's very easy to do.

i tried your method and got about 34 out of 50 rose cuttings to grow roots. i sprayed them with water to gently remove them from the sand and then planted them in pots. now some of them don't look so good. the leaves are starting to wilt. is this just because of the transition from sand to real potting soil or is it something else?

daytonheat, it's was probably the transplant that shocked them. I try and leave the newly rooted cutting alone as long as possible in the conatainer they strike in. Better bigger roots help them transplant easier.

If you have big temp swings you might try turning and old styrofoam cooler into a rooting pot. The thick insulated walls help the dirt at a more even temperature. Pokeing holes for drainage is easy. And most of them are built fairly tall, so if you will leave some space between the top of the dirt and the top of the cooler you will be able to provide some protection for the young leaves when they come out.

Yeh, that first repotting is a bit of a risk. There are two ways to handle it

1/ You can set up two layers of mix, the bottom is fertile and the top is sand + peat. The cuttings stay in the top layer. The root swill find their way to the fertile layer and firm up the plants. The draw back is that it will be hard to wash the soil away and many roots will break when you repot

2/ Take care at repotting time. All the potted plants must stay in shade and away from wind drafts. They also should get frequent water spray for the first 2 days.

It's unclear why when you repot plants, they lose the ability to absorb water for a few days. I think there are almost invisible feeders at the tip of the roots that have established themselves in teh mix. They will be damage and it takes a couple of days for the root to grow longer and produce new feeders before they can take water in again.

While the indoor baggy method requires hardening, I guess this method requires a bit of softening at repotting time.

dmaivn: Can you post some pictures of your starters from last year.... I would love to see them now!
Which roses did the best?

Now what do I do with these babies with winter coming?
They are in small pots with potting soil, had a good looking root system,but I'm sure they can't take the cold.
Will they do dormant? Or just set there and freeze.
Thanks for your help! I have had fun with this easy method.
Wanda

Vow, you guys still remember me! You would be disappointed to look at my picture! I no loner have space after I moved into a town house. I stuffed them into a wheel barrow.

They grow like vegies but still give a lot of flowers. The ones doing well in there are

Kardinal, Princess de monacco, Iceberg, Queen Elizabeth nd Burgundy Iceberg. There is anothe rthornless pink HT that I have no idea about the name but it's very pretty.

On the Winter qeustion, I think people over winter inside a glass house or inside their house. I don't know as Sydney is very warm. It's above freezing point at mid Winter.

All the roses in my photo album I propagated myself. And you would not beleive that they are generally in 1/2 Sun or 1/3, 1/4 Sun.

Here is a link that might be useful: My rose album

I really enjoyed your rose album. Thank you for sharing.

Kasie

Is now a good time to try this? Will I leave them the pot outside all winter? Would love to try this if its not too late! TIA!
jenn- who's never really had good luck rooting roses!

The good time to do it is when the temperature is just above freezing point and rising. I am in a warmer climate where it's only get close to freezing but never gets under. So it's perfect to start rooting right at the time I do Winter pruning. For your area you should make sure the cuttings are not out there when it's under freezing point. I suppose if you have mulch or straw covering them over Winter and remove the cover at end of Winter, they should be OK. Otherwise I think you can store the cuttings in your basement where the air is very cold but wet and sweaty to keep them alive until temperature is right.

I think for the purpose of storage you can sterilise them with mild bleach first, lay them in boxes of moist clean sand and put the box in your basement. I find sand is very good for rooting roses because it's clean, void of nutrients and inhospitable to bugs. This helps to avoid rot.

I live on the outskirts of Melbourne, and tried your method last July. We have colder winters than the city people, and the roses are sometimes about 8 weeks behind the Melbourne suburbs. I collected all the cuttings from pruning, and filled four large pots, using young wood, thick as a pencil, with bud shoots, and sometimes with a heel. They looked good by the end of August, and have kept going. I'm very pleased with the rosebuds opening now, ending the guessing game. Shady Lady, Bonica, Iceberg and The Fairy have taken off, and there are a lot of slower survivors. As it is a very warm Spring, they are against a high wall, facing North, and I spray them every day. I don't want to lose them when I move them into pots, but I'm very pleased I saw your method. I'll try again with the summer pruning, as the weather will be so hot the roses fry. They may as well wait until Autumn for another flush. I had so many pieces of Iceberg that I just dug a trench and popped them in, alongside the north facing wall, and they are growing well.

Thank you so very much for posting this rooting method! I bought four English roses - my first - this May and this first early winter pruning was painful. Knowing the pruned canes may have a brighter future than compost made it easier.

I am pleased to report that all is going very well so far. The two pots containing the cuttings have been in cool, bright shade on the floor of my little greenhouse. The cuttings in one pot have rapidly-swelling leaf buds; I expect they'll be open soon. The other pot was in a spot just a tad cooler and darker, seems a few weeks behind the first pot. The greenhouse is kept at 48-50 degrees at night, and I try to keep it to 70 or below on sunny days.

I'm trying to keep my excitement in check after re-reading this thread and the losses that can still be expected. My only concern is that they will require potting up before they're cold-hardy ... my greenhouse is only 6x8'! Temperature-wise, when is it safe to put these outside? Can they withstand a light, late frost? With several tall oaks nearby, it will be easy to provide provide increasing amounts of morning sun with dappled shade as the day progresses.

Dmaivn, re your post about disease resistance and root-grafting: That doesn't surprise me at all. Years ago, when I was researching the gypsy moth problem that was spreading throughout the northeastern states of the US, I heard the report of one research team that found that oak trees growing close to an oak being defoliated became more resistant to defoliation. It was met with much skepticism, but has become more widely accepted over the years. Apparently some chemical changes take place down in the root systems, signalling the neighboring trees to produce more tannins, which are unpalatable to, and unhealthy for, leaf-eating insects. There's a wonderful system out there, one we are only beginning to comprehend.

Happy New Year, everyone.

Diane

The people who I know use sand with good results use coarser sand, too fine may hold too much moisture. Some people even strain or use a seive to get the larger pieces. I use sand in the warm months with a decent success rate.

Carla

WOW..I am thrilled to try this method with my roses! I have done it with my coleous..But never dreamed I could do it with roses! My brother has a garden center so I can get all the cuttings I want he has all his roses in the greenhouse over the winter. I will just start a pot right in there. To mark the roses, can I use a sharpie marker and write on the rose cutting what type they are? It should stay on depending on the size of the cutting? Thanks everyone..You just saved me tons of money.. I was planning on a big beautiful rose garden next year..ha ha.. I just planned on buying a rose a season..building it slowly. This way I can pride myself on starting each rose. I am sooo excited about this,I am itching to start right now. Thank you Thank you, thank you!

Here is a link that might be useful: my trade lists

I am pleased that this thread is still alive. As so many people are waiting for results I should talk a bit about trying to get as many healthy cuttings as possible.

You will soon find that many cuttings will grow leaves furiously as end of Winter approach. At the first break of Spring there are still cuttings thath ave no sign of growth at all. These cuttings should be removed in my opinion just because it will be hard to keep these into the heat of Spring when they are so late (without roots). This will free up some space for the promising ones to survive.

Next you will find that they grow nice leaves but they do NOT have roots at the bottom. Don't pull up to have a look. I suspect that there is some relationship between the mix and the base of the cuttings helping them to get a little extra moisture into the cane. If you pull them up, you lose this formation.

At this point in time they like gentle air flow, warm morning and cool night. They like a little bit of indirect early morning sun light but no more than 1-2 hour.

The major problem the cuttings will face is sudden variation of temperature. In some regions of the world, the difference between day and night, and normal day and hot day is about 15 - 20 degrees C. That's just insane for rose cuttings if the top temperature reaches above 30C like many parts of Australia early in Spring. Dryness of the air can be a problem too in hot days. The only to counter this is to set up a timer to automatically spray them every 1/2 hours for a few seconds.

If the weather is a bit too warm, they would grow too fast without the roots! Remember that the top couple of leaf sets have to mature before they will help rooting with enough sap flow to the base. This growth takes up the reserved energy and water. There is only one chance. If the leaves won't mature and generate sap flow, there will be no roots. The cuttings will just grow and burn itself out like depleted batteries. Therefore very slow growth rate is the key to sucess.
Fertilizing will kill them. If you spray them with a little soluble fertlizers, they will grow beautiful leaves and within a few days deplete all the reserved energy and water and die!!! So never fertilise them and never use a mix that has fertilisers.

When some of them already have some roots, what can happen? Many things I am afraid

- When you see roots at the bottom, the chance is that many cuttings have roots and many still don't. If you are willing to destroy the ones that don't have roots then you can start fertilising them a little by spraying soluble fertlisers on the leaves or putting inorganinc fertliser pellets into the pot and water it. Otherwise wait another 2-3 weeks while you SELECTIVELY spray the cuttings that are most likely to have roots (you can tug them a little to feel the resistance)

The reason why you would want to fertilise the rooted ones now is because the mix has no nutrients. They have drained all the reserved energy in the canes in order to grow leaves and root. They desperately need feeding but indiscriminate feeding will harm other cuttings that don't have roots.

Finally you need to pot them out and discard the ones that are not healthy or don't have roots (or put the ones without roots back after you have taken other ones out). This is the time when you really appreciate the use of sand! You simply use a gentle water jet to wash the sand away and get the cuttings with 95% of the young roots in perfect condition. These rooted cuttings should be in water at all time until you pot them out individually. You should notice that young feeders are easyto break, bruise and rot. Again you should use sand as part of the potting mix. Rich potting mix goes in first. Normal potting mix goes in second. A bit of sand in third. Then the rooted cutting gets in. Some more sand in. Then normal potting mix fill the pot.

Why 4 layers of mix? The bottom layer is rich with nitrogen which is good once the roots work their way down the bottom of the pot. The next layer is normal mix. Then the sand layer surrounds the young roots that need a relatively clean environment to avoid rotting away. It's a common mistake to use only one layer of potting mix and risk burning the young roots or having little nutrients for their development later.

I have a guess about why many own root roses are sickly for a while until they get a bit older. My theory is that it depends on the rose type. Most modern roses have a life for a cane about 1-2 years. Some of them are even shorter. The aging of a stem is rapid in excessive heat and poor nutrition as it does not generate enough sap flow then bulk to keep it young. So when you root roses, the cane is effectively "old" by the time they have roots and become independent plants. This why they are sickly until they get around to renew themselves. The renewal process depends on sap flow and creation of new bulk (new wood). That's why I have a theory that the "effective" age of a plant or a stem of a plant is the ratio of new wood versus old wood. The bigger this ratio the younger it is. This process take time. It really helps to have lots of leaves growing rapidly. That's why it's better to grow rooted cuttings in shady areas for them to get more leaves. It also help to occasionally spray them with soluble fertilisers to encourage leaf growth during the first 2 months to build up sap flow down the main cane to the roots.