CURIOUS FACT'S ABOUT CUTTINGS.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 237, 6 October 1928, Page 6 (Supplement)

CURIOUS FACT'S ABOUT CUTTINGS.

Perhaps ifc is miracle enough for some growing wood of a plant, stick it in soil >r sand, give it the necessary warmth and noisture, it will in due time develop roots from the buried end, produce new leaves from the upper nodes and become a.new, independent plant. And yet,;in modern language, "You ain't seen nuthin.' yet!" For observe: If you take a growing cane, of, say, American Pillar Hose, or Weigela, and cut into half a dozen three-inch pieces—all potential cuttings and future plants, you would think —and treat them exactly alike, one particular section will take root and start into growth, days and perhaps weeks ahead" of the/others. It may be the third from the tip; it may be the' fifth; but one will lead the others, some of which may never follow suit. Why? What is the determining factor? Again, if you make a series of quite long cutWngs—two feet or several different species of woody plant and insert them alt two feet deep in ,moist sand, where will the roots appear? Well, it depends. In the ease of Khodotypus and AVeigela, at the very bottom end of the cuttings; in the case of Philadelphus at various points along the entire length