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gabro14

Want to try..... (Picture)

gabro14
16 years ago

Hi all,

I am not interested in started Bonsai as a hobby, but wanted to give a go at trying one since a friend of mine had a whole bunch of True Dwarf English Boxwoods (Buxus sempervirens 'Surffruticosa'), and said I can take a cutting. So I went over to one of them and took a cutting. I thought, "why not"? It has such a nice aroma!

Now, I know a lot of you are true bonsai hobbyists, but I just kind of came into this tree, and want to just try it to see what I can do with it. So I am not interested in joining any clubs or reading books. I'm just hoping to get some basic advice and also would like to know how to root it (if that's possible). I did a search on here, but didn't find any information. My friend had saved a tag that came with the boxwoods (she bought them last fall), and kindly gave it to me. So I know the "very basic" care information. One question though....what are the watering needs? I know I must keep it outdoors, but I'm not sure if it likes to be kept moist or if it likes to be kept on the dry side. I would have asked my friend but she had them put in by someone (they were already rooted obviously), and she's not the one who cares for them.

I should ask though, are these typically used in bonsai? I obviously don't want it to have the rounded shape it typically gets, so I will just prune (eventually) with my novice eye. I don't need it to look like a specimen bonsai...just want to see what I can do with it.

Anyway, I'll attach a picture of the cutting I took....so what next? I guess I mostly need rooting advice. I already know that it probably needs very gritty coarse soil, which I have.

Thanks in advance for ANY advice you can give me,

Gabi

{{gwi:6950}}

Comments (13)

  • lucy
    16 years ago

    Hi, first of all, that's not a cutting.. a cutting is an individual small (5") end of branch piece with some leaves on it. Your 'cutting' is a bush, but if you want to root it, I hope it's been in water since you cut it or it's probably too late, though if you cut a single piece now it may work. You would dip the 'root' end in rooting hormone for ~ 1/2" and shake off the excess powder, then stick it (after removing the bottom 1-2" of leaves) into a well mixed, barely moist cup of 60/40 perlite and potting soil, or even pure perlite, and place a clear plastic glass, after just trickling a few drops of water directly around the cutting base. Keep out of direct sun but in decent light and wait. Could be a lot of weeks before it will 'take' and you'll know when that is by the new leaves emerging. If that seems to happen within days, they just may be 'latents' that were ready to pop anyhow and doesn't mean there are new roots yet. Keep just slightly watered if the top of the soil near the cutting looks dry, but err on the dry side normally. When you see roots growing into the mix (more than a couple) then you should transplant to a proper pot with drain holes and a gritty mix, and while it's spring/summer, water when the top of the soil and a bit more is dry (enough to reach the bottom), but otherwise do keep on the dry side once it's established, though water well when you do it.

  • gabro14
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Thanks for the quick and very helpful response, Lucy. I know it looks more like a bush than a cutting...I guess what I meant by 'cutting' was that it was a piece of the bush I took. But I see what you mean...it's definitely not a 'cutting'!

    I figured that I couldn't leave it overnight in nothing, so I took my best guess and this is what I did last night:
    I took about 1-2" of the bottom leaves off (that's what I do with other 'cuttings', so I figured i'd need to do that with this also), then dipped it in rooting hormone, and I potted it in a mix of barely moist potting soil, pumice, and perlite...much more perlite and pumice than potting soil. However, I potted it into a regular plastic pot with drainage holes. So I can transplant it to what you described, but I'm a little unclear on that...what kind of 'cup' should I pot it in, and what do you mean by putting a "clear plastic glass around the cutting base"? (not sure how to do that...unless you mean to cover the whole bush with a plastic glass).

    Also, in case the 'big cutting'/bush doesn't take, I took 3 'real' cuttings off the bush and potted them in my propagating tray that has a clear humidity dome over it (after dipping them each in rooting hormone). I decided to experiment with different mediums, so I put one in pure long spagh moss, one in the above described mix, and one in a 1:1:1 ratio of vermiculite, perlite, and peat (I know peat isn't the best thing to use, but I had that mixture so I just wanted to test it out). From what you described above, I think I'm going to take one more cutting and put it into 100% perlite.

    Thanks again for your advice. Here are some pics to show what I did:

    AFTER REMOVING BOTTOM LEAVES:

    {{gwi:6951}}

    POTTED UP:

    {{gwi:6952}}

    HUMIDITY DOME/PROPAGATION TRAY:

    {{gwi:6953}}

    CUTTINGS IN PROPAGATION TRAY:

    {{gwi:6954}}

  • lucy
    16 years ago

    Oh, you DO have a much better grasp of things than you indicated originally! Sorry if I confused you about the cup, I only meant to root it in something, and the something wasn't very important in itself for the relatively short time it would be in there, especially as it wouldn't be wet enough long enough for drainage to be an issue, but you did it properly! The glass was meant to go right over it all, but as you have flats with covers, it doesn't matter now. In fact, why did you write in again????

  • gabro14
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Well, I don't know anything about this kind of 'cutting', and don't know much about bonsai. I usually work with regular houseplants like hoyas and also work with succulents. This is much more "woody" of a plant than I'm used to dealing with.

    I actually would much rather the big cutting (the 'bush') root...I just put the small cuttings in the tray just in case the more woody stem wouldn't take. The tray is obviously too small to fit the big cutting, so I wasn't sure what to do with that one. But I'm glad I did the right thing with it!

    As to why I wrote in again...I still wasn't sure if I did the right thing in order for the big cutting to root (I wasn't sure what type of medium to use or if I should cover it), and I wanted to check on what you meant by the cup thing. Since you seem to think I used the right medium, I guess I'm ok. Thanks for verifying what you meant by putting the glass over it. I'll put a ziplock baggie over it, since I don't have a glass that would fit over it.

    Guess I have more of a grasp on this than I thought. When I did a search on the bonsai forum about rooting, I read mostly about air layering. So I'm glad to see that I can root this the same way I root other plants. I hope it's similar to rooting my "woody" jade cuttings...I've had some luck with that (both with water rooting and with soil rooting).

    Thanks again for your help. I hope this works! It would be interesting to see what I could do with this.

    Gabi

  • gabro14
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Lucy,

    One more thing. What are the watering needs of this plant/tree, once it's rooted (I'm being optimistic).

    Thanks,
    Gabi

  • lucy
    16 years ago

    Well, as I said, keep it on the dry side. One other thing.. you used vermiculite in your mix, but I would stay away from it altogether as it tends to compact in the soil and keep thing wet (along with the peat you used... ok for rooting, but otherwise keep it far away from 90% of bonsai and definitely away from boxwood which, incidentally, might like a little lime in the soil when you repot for indefinite (if v e r y slow regular growth).

  • gabro14
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Thanks Lucy. I guess I missed that about watering. Yes, I wouldn't think of using either vermiculite or peat in any mixture other than for rooting. So when you say "lime", do you mean to squeeze a lime over the mix? If so, just a few drops? Thanks for the tip..I know nothing about boxwood, so anything helps.

    Gabi

  • lucy
    16 years ago

    No, not a drink, but real lime - you buy it in a bag (though only use a few little pinches mixed into the soil.

  • gabro14
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Ok thanks...I'll look for it in the nursery next time I see it. I thought you meant an actual lime (the fruit)!

    Gabi

  • tanyag
    16 years ago

    Hey Gabi,
    You'll still want to get some sort of glass jar over the big cutting. It works much the same way the clear plastic lid does over the small cuttings, creating a mini greenhouse. If you don't have a glass big enough, you could try to find one of those cheap clear vases. I got one at wal-mart. It is about 12"tall and about 4.5-5" in diameter. It will fit right over the cutting. I've never worked with Dwarf English Boxwood, but have several regular boxwoods (I think they are called Japanese Boxwoods) in my yard. I know once established in the wild, they can grow in almost every condition, including nasty clay soil that goes dry for long periods and then swampy! I know you don't have an in situ spot you could plant it to grow for a while, so I would give it a realy good sized pot once it does root. You could still put it in a bonsai pot, but you'll get a lot more growth if you put it in a regular sized pot for a year and let it do its thing. When you balcony gets finished in July, put it out next to the Jade! ;0) You can still experiment with pruning and shaping it while it's growing. Also, you'll need to start thinking about what you're going to use to shape and prune. I bought a 10 piece set from e-bay last year. I was so worried it was going to be junk, but I had a friend from the Houston Bonsai Society look at them and he said they were pretty good for a beginner to intermediate. There were a few more things I would need once I start going into the more intricate stuff. I finally got my soil sieves about a week ago. Before I was using different size metal netting as a make shift way to get my soil the right size. Heehee. Ghetto Bonsai. I paid somewhere around $65 for the set of tools. You can use a regular pair of small pruning shears for initial pruning, but there may come a time when you need some of the other stuff to do certain things. Just a thought.

  • gabro14
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Hey Tanya,

    Very helpful info! I didn't even think about using a vase! Going to replace the baggie with that. I did think about the fact that I'd have to buy some tools, but since I'm not planning on really getting into bonsai (but that could change of course!), I was going to buy the bare essentials once the cutting roots. Thanks for the Ebay tip...I'll take a look there when the time comes. Small pruning shears to begin with...got it.
    By the way, good memory on the balcony thing :-) They are hoping to be done even sooner (I think they are a month ahead right now, so they should be done by June, maybe even sooner). I will absolutely put the boxwood out there and keep it out there all year round (the tag says it's pretty hardy - "hardy to -10F"). Anyway, can't wait to get my jade outside!!

    Thanks,
    Gabi

  • scenter
    16 years ago

    Gabi:

    FWIW - I've been working with a Dwarf English Boxwood 'Sufruticosa' since January. This plant is very vigorous.

    I purchased it 'dented' at a nursery - there were about 30 trunks in a circle about 10 inches across, and a lot of dead branches, but the plant still had green leaves on top and was uniformly about 2.5 ft. tall, so I bought it for a song ($2.00). When I got home I unpotted it and teased out the roots, to find it was growing in clay - I washed out as much as I could, but there is still a core lump. Since it had suffered at the nursery, and I didn't want to harm the roots any further, I potted it up in a 'big tub' pot using 50% perlite 50% Jungle growth. I then proceeded to remove the dead branches and thin trunks - I got it down to a 9 trunk clump/group style (I can't be certain which it is because of all the roots near the core, and on the surface - one plant with 9 trunks (clump), or a closely placed set of 9 individual trees(group)).

    I then let it recover till last week (our April cold snap didn't even phase it). It has sprouted well from the base, and up along the trunks etc. I refined my design, leaving only 7 trunks (two were blocking others once I decided which should be the front side.), I cleared out the suckers from the base, and I varied the heights of each part based on the strength of the trunk.

    It still doesn't look finished (in fact it looks somewhat unkempt beatnik/bohemian with all this bushy growth), but I am happy with its progress, and if it keeps growing like this I'll have to trim again in about a month. I can start wiring once the new growth begins to lignify.

    So how are your cuttings progressing?

    Peace
    Bruce


  • gabro14
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Hi Bruce,

    My cuttings are doing fine I guess. I haven't looked at the roots...I'm leaving things alone for a bit. I don't notice any new growth (I think it's still too soon). All the cuttings (including the large one) are still in their little "greenhouses".

    I'd love to see a pic of yours if you have one. Sounds like an interesting specimen.

    Gabi

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