My second question of the evening..., I have a Blood Orange tree I have to leave behind in a move. I took many branches and am making cuttings as I hear it can be done.

I made a couple flats with peat, perlite and sand. My cuttings are about 3 inches although a few site on the net say use 6 inches. I know its fall and would assume not the best time to do this but I am trying anyhow.

If there are any tricks or advice anyone has... please weigh in..... I have one more day to take some "tree"!

Thnx, Jeff

Rooting hormone and keep them in semi-light conditions and not too high temperatures.
Mine grow roots even if I put them in water but with a low percent of success.
And I can tell you that 3 inch cuttings are kind of short.

I have read putting some hormone in a glass of water helps... so do u submerse just the ends as too deep of coverage would cause rot?

Jeff, welcome to the forum!

Bottom heat is supposed to help, too. I use a home heating mat on low, with a pyrex tray on top to make it waterproof. It's indoors on a table by a window with filtered light. I've had good success with it so far. It's not big enough for a flat, though.

A very loose medium helps avoid rotting - some even use 100% perlite. I use 100% Turface (kiln-fired porous mineral granules).

Also, increased humidity is helpful to keep the cuttings from wilting. More leaves gives better rooting but also more wilting, thus the need for increased humidity. Frequent (automated) mist sprays are the best, but a loose plastic bag works.

This forum has a lot of discussions on cutting propagation. You can spend hours reading them! Enjoy.

In my experience, sweet orange is very prone to root rot on their own roots. Better to graft to trifoliata or sour orange.

If you want to save some wood for grafting, you can put the budwood in a ziplock bag with some moist (not wet) paper towel an stor it in the refrigerator. You can graft it onto rootstock or another citrus tree to make a cocktail tree. Grafting is best when high temps are in the 70s and 80s and the tree is actively growing.