by Glory Lennon

Created on: July 08, 2009

How to start your own hedge from cuttings.

I stood in horror as I watched my friend take the clippers to her Forsythia. It had been a nice though admittedly a way too big patch of brambles, for her taste anyway. I explained the birds love nesting in that tangled mess. It provides great cover for them from neighborhood feline fiends one of which was her own vicious pet. She continued to snip away, thoroughly ignoring my protests, until the once lovely shrub was barely more than a ball of twigs. It looked horrible.

When she stood back to admire her work I asked what she was going to do with the clippings. She stared at me as if I'd spouted tentacles from the top of my head. This wasn't unusual. She always looks at me that way. She merely pointed to her compost pile as answer. I then asked if she didn't mind my taking some. Again she stared probably wondering at my sanity.

"Have yourself a thrill," she replied. Now it was her turn to watch me, though not in horror, as I stuffed the back of my Astrovan full of seemingly useless branches.

"What are you going to do with those?" she asked.

I explained I was going to make my own Forsythia hedge so the birds she was leaving homeless could find a new home in my yard. The expression of incredulity on her face was priceless when she saw my Forsythia hedge in full bloom some two years later.

Assuming you are not as skeptical as my friend you probably would like to know exactly how you start your own hedge from cuttings. Let's go.

Though getting cuttings to root is relatively easy, it matters which plants you choose to try to clone (yes, making new plants from cuttings is cloning). Some plants are simply easier than others to coax into rooting. But you'll never know unless you try and try again. Thomas Edison after all went through 1,200 experiments before he struck on the successful light bulb. Surely you can be as persistent if you truly want a hedge for free.

Forsythia is one of the easiest shrubs to root but there are many others including Euonymous and Pussy Willow. You just have to make sure you have relatively young branches, not hard wood. Once your branches are selected cut them into1-2 feet long pieces and strip the bottom 5 or 6 inches of leaves starting at the cut edge. For some plants you will have better success if you take branches just before the leaves emerge.

To further enable the rooting process you should expose a good bit of the cambium layer. This is just beneath the outer "skin" on the branch.

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