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Recent Nursery Field Notes

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red lake currants with heavy rooting after just over three weeks. these... - Propagation By Cuttings, July 2026, ASC-164Jul 9, 2026 · Propagation By Cuttingsred lake currants with heavy rooting after just over three weeks. these had some bottom heat for the last week, I have a few heat mats and move things around, it's tricky to bottom heat whole benches and still have good drainage, and most softwood doesn't need it, in fact it can be detrimental if your mist doesn't run for any reason. for anything that needs more than four weeks to root, bottom heat is a good addition. here I have several clumps of rooted cuttings about a dozen to each small pot, the spacing is fine to get them to start and then I carefully pull them apart and pot up into a better mix with far less perlite. this explodes the space required, and takes some planning. this year I may need to expand the shaded zone where these are hardened off for a week to solve a traffic jam.Read field note
goji berries have these attractive purple flowers all summer, they have this... - Grapes And Vines, July 2026, ASC-049Jul 8, 2026 · Grapes & Vinesgoji berries have these attractive purple flowers all summer, they have this unusual perpetual growth through the whole season into late fall where the vines have all stages of fruit - the flowers, green fruit and red ripe fruit. today I collected some cuttings a bit late in the season (july 8), usually june is better but now there are long 1-2 ft shoot extensions of pliable softwood to pick, and that new growth that I'll stick under our mist has flowers and fruit and all! and they root in about two weeks. these goji are growing on established vines (sort of a shrub or an upright vine it's a weird plant) and it's heathy in zone 3 (-40). I've had some difficulty overwintering them in the nursery, but I suspect that they are like grapes, once established the cold hardiness improves. I would advise a sheltered location if you're on the Canadian prairies, or if you're in the city that's probably enough. the fruit are unique tasting, like a grassy tomato, I enjoy them. another fun property, I can root small cuttings and that same fall the small plants will fruit, so I pick them for our seed shop. goji are easy to grow from seed, but cuttings are faster for the nursery.Read field note +4
a native currant with crazy fruit, Ribes gladulosum aka skunk currant - heavy... - Berries And Currants, July 2026...Jul 8, 2026 · Berries & Currantsa native currant with crazy fruit, Ribes gladulosum aka skunk currant - heavy rooting on these cutting after 30 days. even up the stems and out of the pots, that's a strong rooting response. the native currants are just tough, the grow vigorously and in a heat wave when cultivars start to show signs of stress in their leaves. the native ones are always the healthiest looking. this set of cuttings is a mix of local plants found along a lakeside, and seeds the usda sent last winter, I have them in two plots as accessions. this process I've been following, to collect the plants by seeds or cuttings. get them growing in a carefully labelled place in the nursery, and then once per year in june collect the new shoots to make more, it's a fun ongoing effort to build a germplasm, a collection of genetics to grow and preserve, and one day to try some breeding work with. aspirationally, a hybrid between these fruit and a larger cultivar would make a very cool looking fruit. are there any glandulosum hybrids out there? kind of want to make some. did you know that black velvet, one of our fastest growing gooseberries is a cross with the Worcesterberry (Ribes divaricatum). interesting Ribes hybrids are possible, in fact many of them do have some tangled mix of hybridization. Jostaberry is another good example.Read field note +4
black ice plum, a western sandcherry hybrid. I hoped it would share the... - Plum And Cherry Hybrids, July 2026, ASC-217Jul 8, 2026 · Plum & Cherry Hybridsblack ice plum, a western sandcherry hybrid. I hoped it would share the strong rooting potential in other chums - cherry plums as the common name refers to prunus besseyi hybrids like sapalta, opata, manor, new oka, dura etc - a collection of these hybrid bushy plums that go back to the Hansen breeding in South Dakota. Black Ice is a newer cross from Wisconsin, and it's usually grafted. But it's a sandcherry hybrid, so here it is - I'll grow them along with the other chums in our collection. My grafts from last year are fruiting, so it also has that going for it.Read field note +5
wild saskatoons finally ripe, for the next couple weeks the bushes all... - Seeds And Stratification, July 2026, ASC-261Jul 8, 2026 · Seeds & Stratificationwild saskatoons finally ripe, for the next couple weeks the bushes all around our place have these tastey purple berries. they're smaller than cultivar ones, but they flower and ripen on a slightly different schedule and they have the most flavour. I'll collect a pail for seed extraction (and jam) and we'll have stock to grow in the nursery next year and keep our seed shop supplied. native in Manitoba, no one planted these and they're common around the forest margins here, with chokecherry, wild raspberry and beaked hazel. i think cold hardy to zone 2 (we get some -40 here every winter), saskatoon (amelanchier alnifolia) never have any winter injury.Read field note
softwood season is what makes me love propagation. I build this greenhouse... - Propagation By Cuttings, July 2026...Jul 7, 2026 · Propagation By Cuttingssoftwood season is what makes me love propagation. I build this greenhouse for it, and these not fancy benches ad hoc put together for every summer have misting nozzles going off all day. about my fifth year into it, there's a bit of magic in the suite of variables to collect a cutting ... (do some recipe) ... and then get a plant in a pot. it's both easier to get some result than you would expect, and harder to get perfect and know all the ways to kill a plant than you'll anticipate. my posts here lean toward the behind the scenes, because it's what I enjoy and I think it's interesting - maybe there's some educational angle but it's in these small pieces if you find my blog where i've put it together. today is july 6, and yesterday we had a power outage (lightning strike to an electrical pole) so for 18 hours the mist didn't run. I hand watered, but was impressed that none of the cuttings drooped or looked stressed or wilted. quite a few have small roots now, and the mist can get backed off. in fact they're starting to be ready to pot up, especially the ones over a heat matt. this workflow I use, differs from what you might google - I use 4" pots of peat/perlite mix and stick 10-15 cuttings each. it's way too close to grow the plants, but it's perfect to root them. a little easy to get too wet, and then leaves drop, but in the error brackets for it to work, if you have more room then more spaced is better, airflow between misting and at night when it's off is better. there is some fun stuff rooting in here this year, dare I say it's the only collection like it.Read field note +2
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