A friend of mine was sending some magazines to be recycled and found this article, which she thought might be useful, if I wanted to grow my own. (TREES, TREES!) It is a bit early in the season, but you can copy it and see which neighbors, friends or relatives have a plant you could get a cutting from, so you can start your renewable forrest.
Since it is from a magazine article I am going to give all the information I can, so as not to step on any toes if I can help it. Sorry I can’t reproduce the drawings, will try to describe them at the end.
It is from Fine Gardening, Sept/Oct 1998, pg 12. (she was a little behind on her recycling)
Written by Joan Cunnington of Grimsby, Ont., Canada
Title: Propagate Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’ from stem cuttings.
"Although my reliable autumn performer Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’ self-seeds quite readily, and stem cuttings can be taken in summer to root in the fall, an 85-year-old neighbor told me about another easy way to produce dozens of new plants from just a few stems.
"I take cuttings to clone my ‘Autumn Joy’ just as the plants are starting to bloom. Instead of taking just the top four inches, I take the entire stem (a) cutting as close to the base of the plant as I can. I remove all the leaves and flowers, tie the stems loosely in bundles of six (b), and hang them upside down in a cool, completely dry place.
"In six to ten weeks, tiny-leaved plantlets appear in the leaf nodes toward the end of the stems (c). When the plantlets reach 1/2 inch long, I cut the stems into pieces between the leaf nodes. Each stem piece should contain a plantlet. I then transfer the stems to pots of sterile potting mix with the bases of the plantlets touching the soil (d), place the cntainers under fluorescent lights in my basement or in a cool greenhouse, and ke