I have a light set-up, actually two, one in the basement, one in a corner of my south-facing attached greenhouse. I overwinter just-rooted roses, clematis, bougainvillea, and others under fluorescents. You have to keep an eye out for pests, especially spider mites. When it's warm in spring I transplant them to slightly larger pots and grow them outdoors. Then they go into the ground or into a cold frame for the second winter. Hope this helps. Gary

I used regular miracle gro potting mix with nothing else added. I prepared the sticks by cutting them to 5-8 inch sticks and striping all but 2-3 leaves. On the limes i cut the leaves down to 1/3 of the original size. The trifoliate leaves i left whole because they were smaller leaves. 2 strips of bark were shaved off from the bottom up about 1/2 an inch. I was carefull not to cut into the wood at all. The sticks were dipped into this gel rooting hormone.The potting mix was thoroughly watered by soaking the pots of mix in a bigger container of water. I needed to do this because this bag had been sitting opened in my shed for over a year. Next i poked a hole with my finger and inserted the cutting about 2 inches deep and pressed the soil up to the cuttings. The whole pot was put into a plastic bottle cut in half and slipped back together. Its obvious what i did in the pictures above. Kept it covered the whole time except for when i opened them up to exchange the air about twice a week.

Not related. This post specifically refers to deciduous cuttings. I'm also not sure where tip pruning comes in - second time you've referenced that, and I can't recall mentioning it in any thread. Is it a way to encourage a growth flush in newly rooted cuttings? I haven't heard that before, although removing a leaf to encourage the bud underneath to grow is something I have seen mentioned in the propagation of Japanese maples. Perhaps I should have mentioned that this question does not refer to dormant (hardwood) cuttings, but rather to softwood and semi-softwood cuttings taken during the growing season. This post therefore is made with next season in mind.. which I'm sure you can agree is the opposite of impatience ;) Supposedly in some species, Japanese maples and some viburnums being examples, rooting cuttings is easy but overwintering losses can be high. Encouraging a flush of new growth after rooting can drastically reduce such losses.

I just came back home and won't be at the site for another 4 days but they are leucosceptrum japonicum 'gold variegated', dracocephalum argunense, and salvia glabrescens cuttings all seem to have new growth pushing out. I did pinch off some leaves on the top of the cutting so that only 2 leaves remain. Maybe thats why leaves are just simply growing back? I definitely won't mess with the cuttings, I want to know if new growth growing on the cuttings too soon hinders their ability to root.