Last summer I took some cuttings of a rosemary bush in the garden. I didn’t do anything sophisticated with them, I stuck nine of them in a pot of multi purpose compost and left them to it in the cold frame. More by luck than judgement they have rooted quite happily so today I moved them into individual pots.
A couple of the sprigs are looking a bit the worse for wear but in general they look good.
I took them into the potting shed for the next stage. I emptied the pot out to see what was what. All the cuttings had roots. Interestingly, the one in the middle had the best roots of the lot, perhaps because it had more room. There is advice that says we should pop cuttings around the edge of a pot but I’m not sure why that is, it might hark back to the days of terracotta pots. On the basis of this evidence, I’m going to continue to ignore that advice I think.
I potted them all up in 9cm square pots. I might have got away with using 7cm pots but although they would have fitted in, the cuttings seems outsized for those pots.
I put a layer of compost in the pot, made a little well for the roots, plonked the cutting in and topped the pot up with compost. I have added a covering of vermiculite for neatness and to make it harder for moss etc to take up residence.
Freshly rooted cuttings need a good feed, I’ve used a higher than normal concentration of tomato feed, about 3x normal. I’ve just sat the pots in a tray and poured the liquid feed in to the tray.
As a general rule, potted on cuttings should go back to the same environment as they were in whilst rooting, in this case the cold frame. Once they’ve had a good drink I’ll remove the tray and leave them in the cold frame for a while.
If they grow on happily I will take the opportunity to grub up two woody rosemary bushes in the borders to make some room, and have a couple of new ones in patio pots instead, as part of our kitchen herb supply. The rest will go to other homes.
I’ll be back later this weekend with divisions, an easy propagation technique.
The Propagator 
Did you add grit to your compost? Mediterranean plants like Rosemary benefit from a mix with 50% grit. I don’t usually feed my cutting, I use a sprinkling if Osmacote 6 months to feed them while in the pots.
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Nope, they went into compost. I’ll bear that in mind when I pot them on, assuming they survive the experience, thanks for the tip. The logic of feeding the cuttings is that the plant doesn’t have much going for it, little roots, little leaves, gives them a boost. That said, I’m only parroting what I’ve read. I have a trial planned for a month or two when I’ve got more rooted cuttings, fed vs not fed.
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I have tried cuttings in water before, for fuschia, with limited success. If I remember rightly I got one rooted, but with pretty weedy roots. I don’t think it survived the potting up process. It does sound seductively simple to just leave them in water, maybe I’ll give it another go this summer.
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I have also done the same this month. Slightly different though. Having never taken rosemary cuttings before I took half a dozen cuttings and placed them in a glass of water and brought them in doors on 4th Feb. Within a couple of weeks 2 had roots so I potted them up and put them in the greenhouse. I through the others away. I’ll do some more this week.
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…I can spell, please read through as threw – it’s a bit early 🙂
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Hadn’t even noticed, too early for me too!
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