Techniques for Growing Plants in the (compost bin) Autumn
No commentsBy Abel Jones
As a home gardener, fall should be a very special time for you. Fall is the best season of the year for plant propagation, especially for home gardeners who do not have the luxury of intermittent mist. The technique that I am going to describe here can be equally effective for evergreens as well as many deciduous plants.
The old rule of thumb was to start doing hardwood cuttings of evergreens after you have experienced at least two hard freezes. After two hard freezes the plants are completely dormant.
However, based on my experience it is beneficial to start doing your evergreen cuttings earlier than that. So instead of doing “by the book” hardwood cuttings you’re actually working with semi-hardwood cuttings. The down side to starting your cuttings early is that they will have to be watered daily unless you experience rain showers. The up side is that they will start rooting sooner, and therefore are better rooted when you pull them out to transplant them.
To prepare an area in which to root cuttings you must first select a site. An area that is about 50% shaded will work great. Full sun will work, it just requires that you tend to the cuttings more often. Clear all grass or other vegetation from the area that you have selected. The size of the area is up to you. Realistically, you can fit about one cutting per square inch of bed area. You might need a little more area per cutting, it depends on how close you stick the cuttings in the sand.
Once you have an area cleared off all you have to do is build a wooden frame and lay it on the ground in the area that you cleared. Your frame is a simple as four 2 by 4’s or four 2 by 6’s nailed together at each corner. It will be open on the top and open on the bottom. Just lay it on the ground in the cleared area, and fill it with a coarse grade of sand.
This sand should be clean (no mud or weed seed), and much coarser than the sand used in a play box. Visit your local builders supply center and view each sand pile they have. They should have different grades varying from very fine to very coarse. You don’t want either. You want something a little more coarse than their medium grade. But then again it’s not rocket science, so don’t get all worked up trying to find just the right grade. Actually, bagged swimming pool filter sand also works and should be available at discount home centers.
Once your wooden frame is on the ground and filled with sand, you’re ready to start sticking cuttings. Wet the sand the day before you start, that will make it possible for you to make a slit in the sand that won’t fill right in. In this propagation box you can do all kinds of cuttings, but I would start with the evergreens first. Taxus, Junipers, and Arborvitae.
Make the cuttings about 4″ long and remove the needles from the bottom two thirds of the cuttings. Dip them in a rooting compound and stick them in the sand about an inch or so. Most garden centers sell rooting compounds. Just tell them that you are rooting hardwood cuttings of evergreens.
When you make the Arborvitae cuttings you can actually remove large branches from an Arborvitae and just tear them apart and get hundreds of cuttings from one branch. When you tear them apart that leaves a small heel on the bottom of the cutting. Leave this heel on. It represents a wounded area, and the cutting will produce more roots because of this wound.
Once the weather gets colder and you have experienced at least one good hard freeze, the deciduous plants should be dormant and will have dropped their leaves, and you can now propagate them. Just make cuttings about 4″ long, dip them in a rooting compound and stick them in the bed of sand. Not everything will root this way, but a lot of things will, and it takes little effort to find out what will work and what won’t.
This is a short list of just some of the things that root fine this way. Taxus, Juniper, Arborvitae, Japanese Holly, Blue Boy/Girl Holly, Boxwood, Cypress, Forsythia, Rose of Sharon, Sandcherry, Weigela, Red Twig Dogwood, Variegated Euonymus, Cotoneaster, Privet, and Viburnum.
Immediately after sticking the cuttings thoroughly soak the sand to make sure there are no air pockets around the cuttings. Keep the cuttings watered once or twice daily as long as the weather is warm. Once winter sets it you can stop watering, but if you get a warm dry spell, water during that time.
Start watering again in the spring and throughout out the summer. The cuttings should be rooted by late spring and you can cut back on the water, but don’t let them dry out to the point that they burn up.
By fall you can transplant them to a bed and grow them on for a year or two, or you can plant them in their permanent location. This technique takes 12 months, but it is simple and easy.
Information on acacia floribunda can be found at the Acacia Plant site.
Some advice for after school safety
By Frances Klein
In today’s fast-paced world, numerous children care for themselves prior to, or after, the first school bell of the day rings. After school, roughly one in five students from kindergarten to eighth grade, weekly spend time in self-care at least once during every week. Before allowing your child to spend time at home alone, you should:
Remember that you are still your child’s “boss,” even while you are away.
Decide if after-school care is available
Learn how your child feels about being home alone:
Determine if your child can independently solve problems and follow directions
Calculate the duration of time your child would be alone
Contact your local law-enforcement agency to determine cases and varieties of crime in your neighborhood
Create specific rules for your child to follow while he or she is home alone
Provide information to your child about what to do during emergencies, and how you can be contacted
You may also consider the latest child safety products from a child safety store, which could help to constantly keep your child at home, safe.
After determining to let your child spend time home alone, make sure to provide him or her with important information. To begin with, your child should have certain information and be prepared for emergencies. Your son or daughter should know his or her complete name, address, and phone number. Children should also know exact information about their parent or parent’s workplace, and how to contact them.
Prior to children even arriving home, they should take precautions. They must never take shortcuts home and never play or walk alone while returning home. Teach your child that if he or she is being trailed, to spin around, dart in the opposite direction, and go to select locations for emergencies. Also, keys should be hidden and secure when toted.
After children arrive home, it is vital that their homes remain secure. After entering the house, the door must be locked immediately. They should only allow people who they know well and who you have previously approved, in the house. Your child should examine the home before entering it, looking for opened entry points. If something looks amiss, they should call for help from another safe location.
Next, your child should always lock the door after entering and make sure the house is secure. Child safety products from a child safety store can further assure that your child is safe at home.
Lastly, while at home, your child should use the phone to increase security. He or she should check in via phone immediately after returning home. If someone calls for you while your child is home alone, the child should inform the caller that you are unavailable, and not absent. Finally, your child should be aware of how to make emergency phone calls, such as 911.
After school, children have activities to select from, to keep them occupied. If they must spend time at home alone, consider child safety products from a child safety store, to help them to spend it safely.
Learn about frost proof gardenia and pruning gardenias at the Gardenia Care site.
Your Source For Composting Instructions And Information
Save some money when building your home
By Josef Strong
When we decided to build our own home a few years ago, it was an eye-opening experience, to say the least. The end cost was going to be tight so we were exploring different ways to cut costs. We decided on a contractor who was willing to enter into a “Cost Plus” contract. With normal building contracts, the customer is presented with a quote for the cost of construction, and that is the total amount they pay, even if the end cost is higher or lower.
In a Cost Plus scenario, the builder provides an estimate that fluctuates based on the actual end cost of building. So if the kitchen runs an extra $2000 because of those cherry cupboards you have to have, the cost of building is increased as well. On the other hand, if you can find a deal on material, or agree to do some of the work yourself, the customer celebrates the lower costs. We started scanning our builder’s estimate, analyzing where we could pitch in to save.
Flooring: The one that hit us hardest was the flooring estimate for $30,000. We priced around, found sales and decided to install the basement flooring and cork flooring in the kitchen ourselves. We would let our contractor install the hardwood in the rest of the house. This concession saved us $15,000 - we had cut the flooring bill in half! Hmmm, this was fun, what else could we save?
Plumbing: We determined how much of our $15,000 estimate included fixtures and were able to go out and purchase our own sinks, tubs, toilets, etc. on sale for better prices. Don’t forget, the plumber gets a discount, but he doesn’t shop around for the best deals. We ended up saving about $1,100 on plumbing fixtures, but used that saving to upgrade to slate walls in the shower.
Electrical: Our electrician allowed $2,500 for lighting fixtures which we were able to purchase at a local do-it-yourself box store for about $1,200 - a $1,300 saving!
Kitchen: Our contractor estimated $29,000 for kitchen cupboards based on mid to upper scale cabinets. After meeting with the cabinetry people, we got just what we wanted for $22,000 - a $7,000 saving!
Doors: I couldn’t get past an estimate for $7,500 for doors in the home - how could they justify that much money? After counting the doors and getting a price on hardware and securing a quantity discount, we got that price down to $4,000 - a $3,500 saving!
Painting: Our contractor allowed $5000 for painting which is not bad, but still too much. We had no desire to rent scaffolding to paint the high ceilings upstairs, but we decided to take on the basement ourselves, saving $2,500.
Trim: The trim was priced at $6,000, and since we were doing drywall returns on all the windows, we only required trim on the bottom sills of the windows, around the doors and baseboard. My husband had a handy trim air-nailer that rarely got used - up until then. After purchasing the material, we saved $4,000 on labor.
Landscaping: The quote for landscaping was $25,000, much of that figure involved heavy machinery to move dirt and add rocks for a retaining wall. We left that to the experts, but dealt with the grass seed and shrub planting ourselves, for a total savings of $5,000.
All totaled, we saved over $39,000 by putting in a few hours work and doing some extra shopping around. Part of that was used to lower the mortgage, the rest paid for our dream trip to the South Pacific.
To learn about clematis cirrhosa and clematis flammula, visit the Clematis Care website.
Friday, March 5th, 2010 at 10:40 pm and is filed under gardening. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
