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Butterfly Garden

Butterfly Bush Stem Cuttings, where do I start? (lots of pics)

15 years ago

This butterfly bush was already established when I bought my house three years ago, so I dont know what kind it is. I recently had to rescue it from a vine that had wrapped itself around several branches and seemed to be killing it (no small task, let me tell you). It seemed to work because I dont ever recall seeing it bloom before.

Now I want to takes some cuttings so I can multiply it and plant it in other places around the house. Problem is, Im a newbie and have no clue what Im doing. Ive done some reading and it seems like the "placement" of the cut is crucial. Should I cut up high or down low? Should I cut near a active bloom or near one of the ends that havent bloomed yet?

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Comments (3)

mcronin
15 years ago
You will get more blooms on any butterfly bush if you deadhead the spent blooms. Also, I'd recommend about 2 inches of mulch for your butterfly bushes.

Re cuttings:

Cut 4-6 inch pieces where the piece you cut meets a stem/branch-at the node.

Remove all but the upper leaves/buds

Soak the cuttings in water for a day or two

Plant in good potting soil/top soil mixture. I plant each cutting in a separate pot to avoid having to separate the cuttings later

Water regularly

For me, about 1/4 of my cuttings done this way survive. So make at least 5-10 times as many cuttings as you need butterfly bushes.
Good luck.
mike
butterflymomok
15 years ago
I started some cuttings in Perlite. Everyone of them survived. I cut them and stripped them just like Mike did, but then I put them in a plastic container--a shoe box will do--filled with moistened perlite. I put a second plastic container over the first to create a mini greenhouse. Mine rooted in about 4 weeks.

I read about using perlite on the Propagation forum.

Another way is to put the cuttings in floral foam--the kind you use for LIVE flowers. Keep the foam moist until roots appear on the outside. Plant the whole thing. This is also very successful and very easy.

Sandy
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Since it's clearly alive, I can't imagine there's any danger of trimming. It looks like there are 2 (live) tall branches sticking up much higher. Unless those 2 are very sturdy, I would cut them back, just above the lower growing nodes on those branches. If they are at all floppy, they won't be able to support all of the growth they will produce, and start to lean far away from the center. If it's just leaning over another part of the bed, that might be OK, but if it's going to lean into the yard, that could get annoying. If you are going to trim any live parts, I would do it soon before the plant wastes energy on those parts. The bonus is that the trimmed parts are extremely likely to grow if you keep them moist-not-soggy, mostly shady (until you notice new signs of growth.) With most cuttings, it's necessary to remove most of the foliage but I don't find that to be necessary for Buddleia cuttings.
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I have had a butterfly bush quite a few years too. I moved mine from the front to the back two years ago. It must be in a more sheltered location, because I get new buds all along the branches up to as high as four feet. I am in zone 6a. So where I normally would cut mine back to less than a foot, as some have suggested, when it was out in the front, the past two years, I made a decision to let it grow as much as it was able to. I just trimmed back the branches on it to about four feet high. Both years, it has retained a vase shape and bloomed fine, topping out at about 7 feet. Next year, I am thinking I will go back to a lower height, just to give it blooms lower on the bush and maybe a little less height and fresh branching. pm2
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Best I can tell they don't self-seed anywhere near where I live. I spend most of my time researching, identifying, and photographing wild plants for a project I am working on and I have never once seen a Butterfly Bush growing outside of someones yard. The closest thing I have seen to one in the wild in my area is a large bush growing in an old homestead site.. but even that one has yet to self seed anywhere.. and I've been watching it for years. I don't exactly live in the banana belt. We are up in the foothills of the Cascades and every Butterfly Bush I have ever grown has died off during the winter. So I am planning on growing one in a large pot so that I can bring it into the garage for the winter. The attitude I'm getting for posting this is amazing.. if you do not have a Butterfly Bush for trade.. I would politely request that you decline from posting in this thread. Maybe you should start a new thread for the sole purpose of bashing Butterfly Bushes with the rest of the "responsible gardeners in our area" Thanks!
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Comments (24)
I might add that this method of propagation can be used for many other shrubs as well, at this time of year. This is called using "hardwood" cuttings method or because it is done during the winter also called "dormant" cuttings. Because the BB used in the example was stored in a protected spot, it wasn't exactly dormant but I started other BB cuttings at the same time from dormant plants in my garden. The cuttings require no leaves, in fact most won't have any because of the time of year. But the cutting will usually begin to grow leaves and even flowers (like forsythia) before the cutting actually grows roots. The cuttings are taken from the last years growth of the shrub, about pencil thick. Some of the easier shrubs to propagate using this method are forsythia, willows, dogwoods, spireas, blue mist, BB's etc. There are other methods of propagation, used at other times of the year as well. Softwood or greenwood cuttings are used in spring or early summer using new growth from the tips of the shrub or growth that is just past new, that easily snaps off. In this case the cutting already has leaves but you just strip off the leaves at the bottom of the cutting which you dip in rooting hormone. The rest of the leaves remain although if they are large, you can cut them in half to reduce the amount of transpiration. You want some leaves left to provide photosynthesis. There seems to be a little confusion as to what method of propagation to use at which time of year and how it is done. It would be really helpful to get a couple books on propagation to research and understand the different methods and why they are used. Hope this information helps a little.
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irislover_nc
15 years ago
I have been rooting butterfly bushes for several years(i've moved twice) and I never do anything more complicated than sticking the stems in potting soil. I take about a 5" piece, strip all but the top two sets of leaves, and plunk it in a 4" pot of pot. soil. If it is a bit flimsy, I'll poke a hole with a stick first. I keep the soil moist and pinch out any flowers that try to come for a few months.

Looking back in my gardening journal, in 2005 I took 4 cuttings from my blue and 6 from my white on June 23rd and had visible roots at the bottom of the pot on July 11th.

I've done this with abelia, spirea, gardenia, oakleaf hydrangea, and hardy verbenas. I'll repot them in progressively larger pots once or twice and then in the ground they go.

Mere

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