Back in September, I took some root cuttings of my lone sea holly plant They have been looking good for a couple of months now, with signs of roots coming through the bottom of the pot, and healthy-looking top growth too. I have been feeding them with a very weak tomato feed for the last few weeks.
I have long resisted the temptation to turf them out and pot on, but I took the plunge this last weekend. All in all, I am pretty pleased with this attempt. Of 11 pieces of root, 9 have rooted, some with quite an impressive foest of roots.
I have potted them all up into 7cm pots, using sieved multi-purpose compost with a little sand, vermiculite and general purpose fertiliser thrown in for good measure.
They are on unheated staging in the greenhouse for now, I shall move them into a cold-frame in a couple of weeks where they can grow on and toughen up a bit before I plant them out.
As an added bonus, the parent plant, which I thought might be a goner, has also perked up and will be planted out later in the spring.
I’m going to chalk this up as a resounding propagation win! Now all I have to do is avoid killing these little plants…
I’ll be back soon with more propagation rumination.
The Propagator 
I have not grown this since the summer of 1986, when we grew it as a cut flower. I never gave any though to how it was propagated. I wold guess that our were grown from seed, but I really do not remember.
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Can’t beat free plants. You’ll have a great display this year. Do you know which Eryngium it is?
I tend to use a more balanced fertiliser for cuttings and seedlings. Tomato feed is heavy on the potassium whereas your little plants might benefit from more phosphorus
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Not sure tbh. I might still have the label off the pot it came in.
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I so much want to grow these in my garden. I have one and it’s not doing well. Have I over watered it? It has gone brown and weak looking with a couple of miserable flowers. I’ve read your post on root cuttings, so I’m going to give it a go. We are in autumn now, so,it should be the right time.
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I nearly killed my plant so I don’t think I am a reliable source of advice!
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But can I do any of that with no greenhouse or cold frame or any windowsills I can use (cat) or anywhere to do potting out of the rain? Can I???
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Well these were fairly undemanding.
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They just needed somewhere out of the weather.
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These look great! Fantastic to get so many more plants out of just one 🙂
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Worth a look at an old post of mine from about a year ago on helenium division. Oodles of free plants.
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Cool – I’ll check it out! I love free plants, me 😉
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That’s brilliant! How satisfying!
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Never gets old.
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