The innerworkings of a nursery.. Part I

I. Propagation (how we help plants have babies)
There are 4 main ways to create new plants:
A) Seed: We here at The Plant Place grow very few things from seed. Seed propagation has a very low success rate (on average 75%) and can be very time consuming. For example, our asparagus ferns were planted as seeds last August and are just now mature enough to sell. That’s eight months of growing! The other plant we currently have growing from seed is a Sable Minor Palm that was planted at the same time as the asparagus ferns and still have another year to grow before they will be ready to sell!



B) Bulbs: Bulbs are a quicker and more productive way of growing some varieties of plants. On average (with proper weather and temperature) it takes a bulb about 2 months to reach maturity. You can see the remaining shamrocks that we planted in early January and the caladiums we planted in the middle of January are just now reaching maturity. Our other bulb plant, elephant ears, is just now starting to poke through the dirt.

C) Un-rooted cuttings: Un-rooted cuttings have a higher success ratio (85-90%) but we grow very few of these due to licensing, patent and propagation laws. The two most popular plants from this type of cutting that we grow are Wandering Jew and Coleus.

D) Rooted Cuttings: Rooted cuttings are cuttings that we purchase from other companies in other states/countries that have a ball of roots already started. These plants are usually protected from further propagation by strict legislation and often include a royalty fee for the right to grow them. However, while slightly more expensive, they are worth it. Rooted cuttings have about a 99% success rate and generally reach maturity (are ready to sell) in 6-8 weeks. Almost all of our plants are grown as rooted cuttings.