Propagating your plants is a greay way to expand your plant collection and share your favourite plants with friends but sometimes water propagating means you end up with roots that don't settle well in soil and you end up with a failed transfer - in my opinion, perlite propagation solves that!
Perlite propagation is where you take a plant cutting and nestle it intoa vessel filled with perlite and keep a resevoir of water at the bottom of the vessel that doesn't touch the cutting. The idea here is your plant is in an environment with very high humidity due to the water resevoir but develops thicker, soil roots in the chunky perlite that adjust to being in soil far easier.
We've got a great video showing you exactly how you do it and below are all the tools we think you'll need:
Jumbo Perlite - Super big and coarse for propagating or aerating any soil
250mL Squeeze Bottle - For precision watering and mixing up our nutrients
Clonex Clone Solution - To stimulate new roots with all of the minerals they need
Rootzone - The partner for Clonex Clone Solution to support stronger roots
Cup or Jar - Or any vessel of your choosing!
Keep the water resevior topped up - eventually your roots may end up in the water but the goal is to keep the majority of them out of the water (You may be ready to pot up if you're getting a lot of roots in the water!). Here's an example of the Variegated rhaphidophora Tetrasperma from this video after about two weeks:
Let me know if you give this method a go - I'm positive it's going to work amazingly for you but want to hear how you go!
- Josh