Rooting Whole Japanese Maple Branches

[MalsRFun in TN]

Here's my first try. The larger maple cuttings are in the plastic bottles. The others are in pots. I should have removed most leaves, but didn't realize, so now I see a few dead and shriveling leaves. No holes in either box, but I only mist once a week, so there's just about 1/8" of water in the bottom when the box temperature cools. These have now been in the box for a month. The large cuttings are Shishigashira and rootstock JM. The small cuttings are Kashima.

 

[eplov90]

This year I decided to try to achieve the same result but with an approach that doesn’t actually require any bottles.

What I did is buy two plastic, transparent boxes and drilled small holes all over the bottom of one, then took some thick tape and made an elevated band around 15 cm up from the bottom of the drilled box so when it fitting it into the untouched one, I’d have more empty space below and a seal between them.

With that done i filled various pots and a pondbaskets with substrate and then stuck in cuttings of various sizes, including a fairly large trident piece from a trunk chop. I arranged those pots in the top box sprayed it down with water and closed the top.
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All the water drains below to the bottom box, keeping a very humid but not wet environment above.
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This trident chunk below was put into the pond basket in the box on May 29th and you can see decent results in less than a month!
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Early results seem positive but let’s see how the rest of the material in there does since I can’t see in the pots. Currently it contains AP Beni Chidori, AP Arakawa, AP Koto Hime, Trident Maple.

Over the weekend I took the trident cutting out of the shared pond basket, trimmed its roots and planted it in its own pot. The roots are looking great with a near perfect radial spread:



I’ve put it back in the contraption to let it get established and will then transition it out if needing high humidity over the next month using a ziplock bag.

 

[stubmle]

I started a few last week- a bit late, but they were problematic branches I was going to remove anyway, so no harm if they don't make it. 2 cuttings from a Sharp's Pygmy, 2 from a Mikawa Yatsabusa. Not very large branches, only about pencil thickness at the base. No rooting hormone because I forgot to apply it. If it works out, I'll try some larger branches next year. One difference in my approach to those mentioned previously is I am using a white trash bag to cover them- didn't have a clear bag large enough. Hopefully it lets in enough light to keep the foliage going!

No pics at the moment, but I'll post updates as things progress.

 

[MalsRFun in TN]

Here's my first try. The larger maple cuttings are in the plastic bottles. The others are in pots. I should have removed most leaves, but didn't realize, so now I see a few dead and shriveling leaves. No holes in either box, but I only mist once a week, so there's just about 1/8" of water in the bottom when the box temperature cools. These have now been in the box for a month. The large cuttings are Shishigashira and rootstock JM. The small cuttings are Kashima.

Today I was curious about whether any roots were going on at the 40 day mark. None visible yet in my bottles. My small cuttings, which I planted with numerous leaves out of ignorance, are all still green and a few seem to have new little leaves. I pulled one out and it had a few little roots!

Very excited because I think most of the cuttings are going to make it. Today I finished filling more boxes with more Japanese maple cuttings: Kotohime, Saiho, Seiryu, Murrasa Kyohime, Allen's Gold, Nishiki Gawa, and others. Tried a few thicker ones just to see what happens. This time removed most leaves and did both node and heel cuttings.

My conclusion so far is that using bottles, if it works, isn't easier than air layering using the plastic root balls.

 

[MMJNICE]

Today I was curious about whether any roots were going on at the 40 day mark. None visible yet in my bottles. My small cuttings, which I planted with numerous leaves out of ignorance, are all still green and a few seem to have new little leaves. I pulled one out and it had a few little roots!

Very excited because I think most of the cuttings are going to make it. Today I finished filling more boxes with more Japanese maple cuttings: Kotohime, Saiho, Seiryu, Murrasa Kyohime, Allen's Gold, Nishiki Gawa, and others. Tried a few thicker ones just to see what happens. This time removed most leaves and did both node and heel cuttings.

My conclusion so far is that using bottles, if it works, isn't easier than air layering using the plastic root balls.

I'm curious to hear if the shishgashria maples have rooted? I've heard they don't root from cuttings. I'm extra curious because I have a really large one I've been airlayering without Success so this method could come in handy for me at this point for smaller branches. All the smaller branches I've tried to airlayer have failed ,,only the two larger branches I'm Attempting to airlayer haven't dried up yet so it's up in the air if those work yet.

 

[MMJNICE]

The idea is a tight seal between the two bottles, and drainage holes in the top bottle

Meaning for water to escape the bottom bottle it goes back into the rootzone and maintains high humidity in the soil

Even after the top propagator is removed many people in the UK are now keeping not just cuttings but also their small trees in the double bottle contraption and then slip potting them for shows, before putting them straight back

Today I was curious about whether any roots were going on at the 40 day mark. None visible yet in my bottles. My small cuttings, which I planted with numerous leaves out of ignorance, are all still green and a few seem to have new little leaves. I pulled one out and it had a few little roots!

Very excited because I think most of the cuttings are going to make it. Today I finished filling more boxes with more Japanese maple cuttings: Kotohime, Saiho, Seiryu, Murrasa Kyohime, Allen's Gold, Nishiki Gawa, and others. Tried a few thicker ones just to see what happens. This time removed most leaves and did both node and heel cuttings.

My conclusion so far is that using bottles, if it works, isn't easier than air layering using the plastic root balls.

Edit.. just checked the clear plastic balls and I finally have a few roots showing through the ball so hell yeah! Should be nice little tree's if they survive the transplant but still curious about the shishgashria cuttings.

 

[MalsRFun in TN]

Edit.. just checked the clear plastic balls and I finally have a few roots showing through the ball so hell yeah! Should be nice little tree's if they survive the transplant but still curious about the shishgashria cuttings.

My large Shishigashira cuttings in bottles aren't showing roots at the 40 day mark, but that doesn't mean roots haven't started. I noticed that some of the leaves browned and dropped off after a couple of weeks, but now the cuttings all look good and green. I'll let you know what happens next month.

 

[Notsureaboutplantnames]

Today I was curious about whether any roots were going on at the 40 day mark. None visible yet in my bottles. My small cuttings, which I planted with numerous leaves out of ignorance, are all still green and a few seem to have new little leaves.

Did I miss the part that most or all the leaves should be removed?

 

[eplov90]

Did I miss the part that most or all the leaves should be removed?

No you didn't. I thin out the foliage a little but leave most on.

 

[MalsRFun in TN]

No you didn't. I thin out the foliage a little but leave most on.

I was talking about my small cuttings (Kashima JM) that aren't in bottles. All advice on taking those says to cut at a node or heel, then strip all but a couple of leaves. In spite of not doing that, my small cuttings seem to be alive and rooting, based on checking a couple of them. I have my large cuttings (OG JM and Shishigashira JM) in bottles and my small cuttings in pots in the same clear plastic box.

It's been so hot that I do spray with copper fungicide once every two weeks.