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I remember the sunny kitchen windowsill where Grandma Adams always kept her slips. This prim and proper Victorian lady wasn’t revealing Victoria’s secret—she was propagating houseplants and tender perennials through the old-fashioned and low tech method of “slipping” or rooting cuttings in water. I always found the process miraculous. How did those bits of leaf and stem know to grow roots? And where was their soil? You could see the roots elongating day by day. Fascinating!
The process is a simple one. Take a water glass that is wider on top than on the bottom. Fill it with plain tap water. Add a chunk of aquarium charcoal if you want to be fancy, though Grandma seldom bothered with that. Then put a leaf and stem of something like an African Violet in the glass. Set on a partially sunny windowsill, the stem will soon begin to grow roots. You must keep the stem submerged at all times and the leaf must be over the rim where it can get air. Don’t fertilize. Plants, being persnicketty, may root or may turn to mush. If the cutting just rots, start over. But when the roots of a successful slip are a few inches long (enough to support the plant if grown in soil) you transplant it into potting soil forever.
Transplanting into soil is a tricky stage—the cuttings are very vulnerable to root disturbance and may die, even if they grew lots of roots in the water glass. The “gentle” method is to add a tablespoonful of soil to the glass each day until all the water is displaced and the plant is rooted in soil. The “harsh” method is to just repot as if the plant had originally rooted in soil and keep it a little damper than usual for a week or two. I have tried both methods and had some success and some failure with each. Wait until you are certain that the roots are happy in potting soil before you give them a very diluted drink of liquid houseplant fertilizer. Those new roots can burn in too strong a solution.
What plants slip? Many common houseplants, especially those with thick leaves and stems, do well with this method—Scindapsus, Wandering Jew, Jade Plant, African Violet, Philodendron and Impatiens are all candidates to try. Some outdoor plants can also root in water. These include Wax Begonia, Vinca, Ivy, Aster, Willow and Privet. It doesn’t cost anything to experiment and you may be surprised at the results—a perfect clone of the parent for free!
Then there are the plants grown in water and never transplanted. In the Sixties
we grew Avocado plants from pits. Grandma was fond of growing a Sweet Potato
vine in a canning jar. She would push three toothpicks into the tuber about
half-way up and suspend the bottom half in water. Unless the tuber was treated
to prevent sprouting (some grocers do this) it would soon turn into a lovely
leafy vine that she could train to go around the window frame. She used yarn
and thumbtacks to make her trellis. After a few months, the vine would be six
feet or longer. Permanent water plants do need some plant food on occasion—just
not too much. And you need to change the water every week. But it’s really
very simple to slip. Try it with your children. They’ll enjoy it as much
as Grandma and I did.
Hortsense: Managing plant problems with Integrated Pest Management
