Snapdragons are hands down one of my favourite cut flowers to grow. They add such great height to a bouquet and look absolutely stunning in the garden too.
These little beauties are definitely on the slower side when it comes to growing! Pinching the tops out when they get bigger will mean that the plant starts to branch and will give more stems.
Instead of throwing the tops away, you can propagate free plants from them! Double your stock and skip the slow process of the starting again from seed!
Cut the main stem out above the 2nd pair of true leaves. Remove any lower leaves and if there are a lot of leaves on the tip, you can cut these to reduce the surface area of the leaves. This is done to help the plant by reducing the amount of much water it will lose through transpiration from the leaves.
We want to do everything we can to help it put all its energy into growing new roots and establishing itself as a healthy little plant.
I dipped the cutting into a little rooting hormone and put them small pots of peat free compost mixed with some perlite.
I made sure that the stems were all the way down to the bottom of the pot, as these will sit on a heat mat and it’s important to get the stem in contact with the warmth to help it to root more quickly.
I put the pots into a tray and filled it with about 1 cm of water to allow the pots to suck up the water from underneath. I popped a propagator lid on and sat them on the heat mat. I made sure that the water was topped up regularly and after about 10 days, they had the most amazing root system!!
I potted them up into 7cm pots and have grown them on in the greenhouse.
15 out of 17 of the cuttings I propagated took, so I’ve almost doubled my stock for free!
Let me know if you have any questions and tell me if you think you’ll give propagating Snapdragons this a try!
