Ivy and Boxwood Cutting Experiment

Since I have more time on my hands, I've been hopelessly devoted to cleaning up my garden and adding new plants to our apartment. This includes propagating some plants I've been wanting to try like ivy and boxwood. My apartment complex has the best landscaping. We have geraniums flourishing at every parking entrance, tulips and bearded irises sprinkled across the apartments, hydrangeas popping up everywhere, rose bushes, ivy, boxwoods, and even an Olive tree which is oddly placed over the garbage place. The gardeners don't mind if we take cuttings from the plants since it kind of helps them out with trimming! I've actually gotten a lot of nursery pots and seedling trays from them too. After they plant the plants in the ground, they have no use for them so I asked them if I could have them and they are more than happy to give it to me! Plus they know who I am since I'm the only one with 9 feet tomatoes peaking over the fence and a very busy garden in the back.

The other day, I decided to try to root some boxwood and ivy cuttings. i think the boxwoods will take a bit longer since they were all semi-hardwood cuttings that I took. All the websites suggested that it would take 5-6 months for them to root. I'll just wait and see. For the boxwoods, I basically dipped them in water and them in rooting hormone (I use "rootone") and stuck them in some potting soil. I covered them with a plastic bag to retain constant moisture content for the cuttings and now I wait patiently!

For the ivy, I basically went out and cut some very long vines from the bushes we have in front of my apartment. The stems were fairly thick and some of them actually had started producing little roots so that's always a good sign when you want to propagate something. I cut 4 inch pieces below the leaf nodes and stuck them in the soil. This time around, I decided to try two different methods: rooting in water and rooting in soil. The majority of the cuttings went into the potting soil and covered with plastic but I took a handful of them and put them in a jar of water. Some websites I've read say to change the water every 2 days. I'll stick to that and see how long it takes. Here's hoping we get a lot of ivy plants to give away!

On another note, I received a couple of garden catalogs the other day and I have been drooling over the different types of veggies and plants out there. I recently got two kalanchoes and an african violet from the 99 cent store the other day so hopefully the kalanchoes will bloom and last for awhile. I'll try to propagate them but we'll see. They were only 99 cents so it might be worth it to just go get some more.

The african violet I got needs some tlc but the flowers are these little bright pink flowers that I love. I'll try and propagate a leaf from it to ensure I have more of those to come. I am absolutely in love with african violets. They are so easy to care for and they bloom for most of the year. I've propagated several leaves from my african violets and they are doing really well. To propagate some of your own, click on this link for directions.

I'll keep my ivy and boxwood cutting experimented updated in the next couple of months. I'll of course post pictures of the progress...Wish me luck.