Geranium Stock Plants & Growing On
I am trying to establish some good stock or ‘mother’ plants. These should be strong healthy plants from which I can take cuttings. I feed them up and disbud to get stems rather than flowers. The first step is to select plants you want to replicate. You want to aim for quality stock of a variety you like. I am interested to see if the children from the 2 tone plant below have similar characteristics.
How to take geranium cuttings
- Take lots of cuttings from your geraniums in April – August. They should be ready to be replanted in a month.
- The healthiest part of a plant is nearest the growing tip so short cuttings are best I aim for 3-5″.
- Choose individual cuttings that are firm healthy and without flower buds.
- For more cuttings chop your geranium mother plant back by two-thirds aiming to cut immediately above a bud. The stem tips will then form the basis of your cuttings. Select cuttings that have plenty of shoots or nodes.
- Strip almost all the leaves from the stem, leaving only the top pair.
- Pinch out any tips that look like they might develop into flowering shoots.
- Insert the geraniums cuttings into a gritty mix of compost.
Growing On
- Experience says you get better growth and flower density from younger stock.
- Place cuttings somewhere bright but cool and keep their compost moist at all times.
- If you want to keep the mother plant thin out all the spindly wimpy stems. With geraniums some growers keep the grandmothers and great-grandmothers –.
- Pinch 1/4Â inch off the top of a stem and 2 new stems will grow making a bushier plant.
- For a quick result plant three cuttings of the same variety into a large pot to grow into one bumper-sized plant.
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