Property News · May 8, 2016

Gardens: tomato cuttings that’ll shoot up


The side shoots on a tomato plant make fantastic cuttings – so think before you throw them awayIf you are anything like me, at this time of year your windowsills will be covered with little tomato plants just beginning to produce their very first side shoots. Conventional wisdom says to nip out these lateral shoots that spring up at the axils, where the leaves meet the stem, in order to concentrate the plant’s energy on producing fruit. Unlike many pieces of received gardening wisdom, this advice is well supported by trials and scientific evidence, giving you larger fruit and earlier harvests. It’s what it says to do next, confining these shoots to the compost bin, that I think is a missed opportunity.You see, the vigour that makes these lateral shoots a drain on the parent plant’s energies also means they make fantastic cuttings. Being packed full of growth hormones, they are super easy to root and their incredibly rapid growth rate means they often catch up with their parent plants within as little as a month. Continue reading…

Source : theguardian.com
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