When to Take Plant Cuttings | Seasonal Propagation Calendar

The Secret to Free Plants

Would you like to grow more / new / free plants from the ones you have?

One of the easiest methods is to take cuttings and root them for new plants. Not only is it faster than sowing from seed, but there are opportunities to take cuttings from spring to fall. Sowing from seed or growing from starter plants is great for annuals like veggies and single-season flowers. Growing from cuttings is smart for many of our perennial plants, shrubs, and vines, as you’ll see in the lists below.

Once you try rooting plants from cuttings, you may realize a few things like I did. First, I suddenly wondered why I ever paid for young starter plants, since they are one snip away in the garden. Next, I realized that plant propagation opens up a whole other dimension of gardening, nature, plant observations (seeing how they grow and change), and being outside. It’s a ticket to indulging more in a great love.

The free plant cutting calendar I’ve provided here is a starting point. There’s no way I can list all the plant choices you can grow this way—there’s oodles—but I have listed some common ones to give you ideas. And, because methods can vary depending on the plant species, I suggest you find tutorials specific to your plants.

Related: 5 Basic Plant Propagation Methods

Recommended Books

See it Here	See it Here

My favourite resource book is Grow Your Own Garden: How to Propagate All Your Own Plants by Carol Klein. (2010). It has step-by-step photos for every propagation method and a huge amount of useful plant info.

If you have access to used books, also look for The Plant Propagator’s Bible by Miranda Smith (Reader’s Digest). It’s a small book and packed with great info.

How to Take Clematis Cuttings

Work with Nature

I must also say that while proper methods can yield good results, nature is very forgiving. Years before we made gardening such a silly, formal procedure, gardeners knew to simply take cuttings from plants they like and stick them in the ground. That was early cutting propagation and it worked well enough. So, don’t think it’s a big deal. Sometimes simple is best.

Plant Cuttings in Each Season

Spring is the time for softwood cuttings from many plants, perennials, shrubs, and vines. These young cuttings are eager to root but also at high-risk for drying out without proper care. See How to Take Softwood Cuttings for step-by-step instructions.

Summer is the time for semi-ripe cuttings, where the base of the shoots are hardening up (maturing) but the tips are still nimble.

By autumn, the plant growth is mature. Fall and winter hardwood cuttings can be slow to root but more stable than tender young cuttings, allowing over-wintering in a cool greenhouse or under some protection outdoors. See How to Take Hardwood Cuttings for step-by-step instructions.

Other propagation methods include:

1. Starting from seed
2. Division
3. Cuttings
4. Layering
5. Grafting

You can find instructions for all of these in Grow Your Own Garden: How to Propagate All Your Own Plants by Carol Klein.

Free Printable

This free two-page document is in PDF format and you can download it to your device and print it out if desired. If you are new to downloading files or ebooks, this provides a free ebook and instructions.

When to Take Plant Cuttings

Mid-Spring to Early Summer | After Last Frost

Take cuttings from new growth.

How to Take Softwood Cuttings tutorial

Here’s some suggestions. Some plants can be rooted at various stages of growth and appear on more than one list.

Summer Semi-Ripe Cuttings

Take cuttings on maturing stems (base is hard, tip is soft) in late summer.

Here’s some suggestions:

How to Take Hardwood Cuttings

Fall & Winter Hardwood Cuttings

Take cuttings from mature stems in autumn after leaf drop but before ground is frozen or late winter just before bud-burst.

You can see my tutorial and step-by-step video on taking hardwood cuttings here.

Here’s some suggestions:

Free Grow-From-Cuttings Printable Garden Calendar

This free two-page document is in PDF format and you can download it to your device and print it out if desired. If you are new to downloading files or ebooks, this provides a free ebook and instructions.

How Do I Take Cuttings?

Very generally, taking cuttings involves identifying a suitable plant shoot, cutting it off with a sharp, clean knife or pruner, at a specific location near a leaf node, and placing it in growing medium. Use of rooting hormone is sometimes recommended.

See Rooting Hormone here

See Fiskars Snips here

This article on How to Grow Shrubs and Vines from Hardwood Cuttings has a step-by-step video if you would like an example to follow.

Specific instructions depend on the plant species and the time of year. Methods and opinions vary. Fortunately, gardeners with different approaches often both get good results. It is best to look up the plant you want to propagate and follow specific instructions for that species and method.

Recommended Resources

These are two of my favourite books on plant propagation. They have photo tutorials for growing plants from a variety of methods.

Once you know the basics, it’s super fun and addictive.

Grow Your Own Garden by Carol Klein was the first one I bought and still the one I refer to most.

See it Here	See it Here

If you have access to used books, also look for The Plant Propagator’s Bible by Miranda Smith (Reader’s Digest). It’s a small book and packed with great info.

For example, try searching (in Google or Bing), ‘How to propagate lilac from cuttings’, and see your options.

Depending on whether it’s a softwood, ripe-wood, or hardwood cutting, there are a few different things to know. Alternately, plants like begonias propagate nicely from leaf cuttings, so a specific tutorial is best.

Nature is a survivor. In the old days, gardeners propagated favourite shrubs by taking cuttings and sticking them in the ground. Done! Be willing to experiment and have fun with it.

~Melissa the Empress of Dirt ♛

Next

• Succulents | Propagate leaf cuttings
• How to grow shrubs and vines from hardwood cuttings
• How to grow new plants from softwood cuttings