CHE REFERENCE LIBRARY - ZetaTalk

PROPAGATIO:~T BY iktEAN8 OF CUTTINGS 109cuttings are commonl>r cut below a bud or to aheel, but this is unnecessary in easily rootedplants like geranium,coleus, heliot.rope.Fig. 116shows an oleander --cutting at a, acarnation at b, anda geranium at c.A coleus cuttingis illustrated in One fol’m Ofchrysanthe-Fig. 117. hIany mum cuttinggrowers prefer to ix g).make a larger cutting of certainfirm-wooded plants, likechrysanthemums, asshown in Fig. 11X. A bed of dracenas is shown inFig. 92, a.nd one of the cuttings is drawn in Fig. 119.Sometimes the growth is soshort or the stock so scarcethat the cutting cannot be madelong enough to hold itself inthe soil. In such case a toothpickor splinter is tied to thecutting to hold it erect, as inthe cactus cutting, Fig. 120, orthe geranium cutting, Fig. 131.In the window-garden, soft cuttingsmay be started in a deep Fro. 120.plate half or two-thirds full of ~$us~~~-jsand and then filled to the brim F; !~~linterwith water, and not shaded ; J ’this method, practiced on a larger scale,FIG. 121. Cutting heldby toothpick (x 5). is sometimes useful in the hot summer