Leaf cuttings

[mat_man444]

I need some help with leaf cuttings. I tried a few earlier this year, but they died off. I followed the directions on a site (by the way it is a great site just not much on cuttings). Any suggestions

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[vft guy in SJ]

Theres not much to it.... what I do is dig out the soil at the base of the leaf I am going to "cut". (back of a spoon works well for that) Then I grab the leaf in 1 hand and take a butter knife and place it right at the base of the leaf where it meets the plant, gently pulling on the leaf while simultaneously pushing down with the butter knife. This does a good job of getting a good size piece of the rhizome with the leaf and avoids the leaf breaking at a point you dont want it to. After that simply lay the cutting on standard cp mix cover the rhizome end with a pinch of soil and put it under the grow lights. In a few weeks you should get sprouts from the rhizome end.
I have read that trapless leaves will work too. Also I read just today that someone got sprouts from just a broken off trap.

Good luck
Steve

 

[BigCarnivourKid]

Another good way to take leaf cuttings, is to do it when you are transplanting in the early spring.  You have the whole rhizome to play with this way and can end up with boocoo (have no idea if this is spelled right

) plants.  I did this with one of my common VFT this spring and all but one of the 8 cuttings took.  The only thing I would do a little different would be to seperate all the leaves before sticking them into the soil to root.  I left two clumps of 3 or 4 leaves, stuck together figuring they would die (I had been pretty rough peeling the rhizome apart) and now have two clumps of clumped VFTs in the same 3" pot.  OK maybe I should have done that different too and put them in their own little pots

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[mat_man444]

Thanks.

When exactly should I transplant?

Before growth starts or after?

Thanks again for the help