Graaaduuuallly open the baggies a bit a time, for longer periods, as the roots develop. They're pretty delicate at this stage, but congratulations! the roots are there. They'll do well in cool mild weather but protect from frost (like the one coming up this weekend).

Once the baggies are off for good gradually expose to more & more light. You can start weekly, weakly (Kim's phrase) fertilizing with 1/2 or even 1/4 strength liquid fertilizer after they are potted up, out of baggies & acclimatized.

And I'd LOVE G. Nabonnand & Maggie if & when you have extras.

Can I root you some more Caldwells? It roots so easily I could just throw the clippings on the ground & they'd root. Real easy keeper & such a good bloomer I'll forgive its lack of scent. I'm watching my teas & chinas with you in mind--Mme. Antoine Mari, Ducher, Marie Pavie have a lot of stems that I can take cuttings & others will in a few months.

Josh, if it were me, I'd leave them for a while and watch very closely. In my case, growing them inside a south facing window, I put them in soil around Thanksgiving weekend, left them until spring, then moved them outside in spring, removing the baggies just a little at a time.

Bluegirl,

Thanks so much! If they all make it through the gauntlet here in the next few weeks, I will set the extras of those two aside for you! I definitely owe you some roses. And if the Allen Cemetery China roots, can I send you one of those as well? I have 7 cuttings processed as of today. Now I just have to wait and see if they take root.

Ogrose,

So I would ideally leave mine in their current arrangements until spring, and harden them off then?

Josh

Congrats on getting the baggie method to work!

I begin to harden off my cuttings when I see decent roots on the side of the container (in my case, a milk jug) and, ideally, when the cutting has broken bud and is beginning to produce leaves ... though this last part may or may not apply to all cuttings. We have to be flexible.

The idea is to gradually acclimate your cuttings to the conditions outside of their warm, humid bag. Start by opening the bag a little, then a bit more, then a bit more, with days in between each change. Soon, you will have the bag completely open ... then you can repot your cuttings and treat them like the cute baby roses that they most certainly are.

josh, I'd love mons tillier & maggie if you have extra. I visit my son & his family in the North Dallas area every few months & would drive over if you're anywhere close. thanks

I haven't been successful yet in rooting cuttings & am quite envious. best of luck.

Just an idea I am using for after the cuttings have been transplanted to pots - I have two in terracota pots which have been on my back porch for months. The new plants are maybe 4 inches high. Time to go outside, except that we just got our first rain of what might be months of rain, and I don't want them to drown....Also, and more importantly, our deer are still lurking in the garden. So, as it was time to pull our tomato bush out of its half wine barrel and put it on the compost heap, I did that and then put the two little pots just to sit on top of the dirt in the wine barrel where the tomato plant had been growing. Then I put the tomato cage back on, but not the other larger cage we had outside of it to keep the deer off. Then I put a sort of "tomato greenhouse" plastic sleeve thingy over the tomato cage - it is meant to do that, so it fits perfectly. It completely covers the tomato cage, and has a lid on the top with a zipper so you can open the top if you want. We zipped it up, and the little plants get light through the plastic. They survived our 48 hours of rain just fine, have good light and drainage, and if the sun comes out I will open the top of their new home. I plan to leave them there until late March, when it will be time to plant more tomatoes...

I did this last year, and everything worked great except that I had forgotten to label the roses, so I had to wait until they bloomed to figure out who they were.....

Jackie

Josh, I'd love an Allen Cemetery China, when it's available--thank you!
Gee, I need to try baggies again--I've never had them work--the cuttings always rot. But I'm inspired to try again, maybe use drier & more coarse media.

Jackie--that is just brilliant. What a wonderful mini-greenhouse.

jackie, I'm impressed by your ingenuity. keep us posted.

Jackie,

I will have to acquire something like that. I will need a greenhouse like structure to grow the cuttings up in come spring time...

Josh

I keep all my seedlings and rooted cuttings outside in one of those little green houses I got a Big Lots. It was only like 20 bucks and I've had it for about 5 years now. We just bought a new one this spring because I needed more space, lol!