Every gardener has his own preferences. Someone tries to plant only "useful" fruit-bearing trees, someone loves decorative conifers. I am for compromise.
In my garden, sprawling apple trees are perfectly combined with a handsome juniper. And by the path from the gate to the house, blue spruces are "seen off". And, if every spring you have to "fork out" for fruit seedlings, then you can plant conifers in your garden for free. I’ll tell you how today.
Juniper
I set up my first experiment with juniper. I cut off a couple of twigs from my friends in the garden.
The cut must necessarily be "with a heel" - a stiff thickening at the base of the branch. We remove the needles from the tip, which we will root, and lower the branch into a solution of a root growth stimulator.
I use the tried and tested "Heteroauxin". I say right away this is not an advertisement. You can use any other stimulant you are accustomed to. 1/10 part of a Heteroauxin tablet for half a glass of "snow" water. Natural water from melted snow is very beneficial for plants.
Our cut branches must stand in the stimulator for 16 hours.
There is also a natural alternative to a chemical stimulant - aloe juice, which must be squeezed into a glass of melt water (one medium leaf), and the cut branches should also be left in this solution.
Important! You need to start the rooting process (as well as sow seedlings) on the growing moon when the plant gathers strength.
After 16 hours, we take the twigs out of the solution and add them to the prepared containers with soil. The ideal soil for this would be a mixture of perlite, peat and sand.
Spruce
Spruce seedlings can be grown in a similar way. We also cut off the branches with the "heel" and soak them in the stimulator. For ate, instead of "Heteroauxin" it is better to take succinic acid (0.02%).
Instead of soil, this time we use sand. We dig in the soaked branches in the sand (preferably at an angle of 45 degrees), water a little.
We place the containers with sand and twigs in plastic bags and practically do not water them anymore - we just spray them every day from a spray bottle and close the bags, creating a greenhouse effect. Such "spruce greenhouses" should not be kept warm - they will feel much better in a cool, but rather bright place.
Instead of sand, you can use moss soaked in water.
Put the moss on a strip of cotton cloth and wrap the cuttings soaked in the solution in it. Then we put plastic bags on the resulting rolls and put, again, in a cool place.
The best time for grafting conifers is from mid-February to mid-April. So now is the time. Good luck with your experiments!
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