Hi Holly, you're welcome! If you try soft wood cuttings, the wraps won't work. You'll need to either do something like Mel Hulse suggested in The Rose Rustler's Tool Kit (linked below), or the bottle method others have had success with and has been offered here on the forums. My micro climate doesn't work covering cuttings and it's arid enough that uncovered, most soft wood cuttings fail, so I can't offer you advice on that method. If the material you wrapped wasn't sufficiently dormant, it may not have contained sufficient stored nutrients to carry it through the rooting process. They won't absorb nor generate food until they have roots and leaves, so the several weeks required between cutting and wrapping them, and formation of new leaves and roots all require the food the cuttings already contain. That's why in my garden (climate) I don't have success with most until late December to mid January as they don't shut down enough to contain what they need until then. In particularly warmer "winters", they may not store enough nutrients at all, as they never really "shut down". In colder climates, they could probably be successfully wrapped earlier and even much later than here because they remain dormant longer. Mine began growing and flowering in February, so my window was quite short this year. I did have success with cuttings taken from my sister's garden in Newhall up in the Santa Clarita Valley, where it's been colder so the roses didn't begin pushing until a few weeks after mine did here in Encino. If you're seeing roots out the soil bottoms, sure, lift them higher, exposing more of the cuttings. You might want to do that first while leaving them in the dappled light, unless it's very damp/humid in your garden. In wetter conditions, you can safely put them in greater sunlight without the fear of them frying. I'm experiencing a bit of fry now that it's getting a lot more intense, but the only ones not succeeding are the ones I expected to have issues with. I wrapped some I've never had much luck with to see if that would vary from year to year. I also wrapped material which wasn't in the greatest shape to experiment. Those are the ones which aren't doing as well, but most are coming along as I expected them to. A few probably too well! The Smart and Final (great place!) 16 oz foam cups are what I've found the most cost effective and easiest to use until they out grow that size. Then I put them into gallons, but the 16 oz size is fine for quite a few weeks and I'm getting my third year of use out of most of them so they're particularly cost effective. Good luck! Kim Here is a link that might be useful: The Rose Rustler's Toolkit

If you're growing them on indoors and the humidity is high enough to prevent them from drying out, leave them that length unless they begin to die back from the tops, then cut them shorter as they turn. If you're growing them outdoors and you're getting rains to keep them hydrated or the humidity is high enough to prevent them from drying out, leave them that length. I have to make mine shorter so I can bury more of the canes because I live in a savannah type climate. While we CAN get dews and occasional fogs, it is usually too arid for that much cane without roots to support it to remain alive and full enough of water to work. It rained several inches yesterday and into this morning. Now, it's a very cold, very dry wind. The water standing in the low spots in the street has already dried up. The wet soil in the shade of the house where the sun doesn't hit this time of year would usually remain wet for weeks this time of year. It's already beginning to appear to dry out because the wind is so arid. My climate just doesn't have the humidity or rain to support that much exposed unrooted cutting. If yours does, go for it! If where you're growing them on has enough moisture, go for it! As long as you can keep them alive, using longer cuttings should provide more stored nutrients to support the cuttings until they actually root and begin feeding themselves. If they appear to be shriveling because they're drying out and you can't increase the humidity or keep them sprayed with water a couple of times a day, trim them shorter. Longer cuttings like yours work quite well in mist propagators where the system mists or fogs the cuttings at regular intervals to keep them from drying out. If you need to, you can do the same, or you can cut them shorter so more of the total length is buried in the dirt. Does it make more sense now? Kim

Hi Judith, they sound precisely as they should. Not all form actual roots in the wraps, though many do. As long as they are well callused, go ahead and plant them. I pot them as deeply in the cups as possible so much of the actual cane is kept damp, dark and cool which seems to stimulate them to root more successfully. Once the cup bottoms appear relatively filled with roots, I raise them higher in the pots, putting more soil under them and removing that higher up the canes so they are exposed to the light. Any green tissue will produce chlorophyll and feed them. It appears to help stimulate them into forming more roots and pushing leaves and wood faster. I've noticed from the four batches of wraps I've done since Christmas Eve that the most successful material is the thickest the variety produces you have available. I deliberately processed cuttings of varying thicknesses to see which appeared most successful. So far, even though they callused quickly, the thinnest wood of all types have failed while the thickest material of all the varieties is pushing roots out the drain holes. I also began experimenting with a few other types of plants in the wraps. Lilac callused two-thirds successfully. Four of six cuttings callused and are growing after one month of being potted. None of the Caesalpinia cuttings callused or rooted, though they remained greenish but turned a bit bronzy in the wrap. They didn't rot nor dry out. I potted them to see if they would root. We'll see. Myrtus communis compacta, Dwarf Myrtle, works well in the wraps. Annie Laurie McDowell worked 100% as did an old Arena Sweet Afton and Perdita. Morey's Pink was another 100% take from the wraps and after a month of potted up. Buck's Maytime has been a near total bust. The thickest pieces of Pink Petticoat are rooting like mad, but the thinner cuttings have failed. Gardens of the World succeeded nearly 100% with those of nearly the thickness of my thumb pushing roots and new growth very quickly. It's as if the thicker wood was at the right stage of food storage and dormancy to perform perfectly with the method. I received cuttings from a friend in Texas two weeks ago, which I unwrapped this afternoon. Of course, the one I most wanted, failed completely, but one of the three cuttings had already begun to turn dark in transit. The other two began turning black in the wrap. Those of her four new HT seedlings callused 100%. Velvet Fragrance, which I wrapped at the same time, callused 100% and has begun pushing new buds. It's going to vary a lot from batch to batch, type to type and location to location, but it seems as long as they callus well and can be kept cool, damp and dark enough while they form roots, it works for a wide variety of roses. Congratulations! Kim

I love breakfast burritos. I use potatoes, eggs, bacon or sausage, ham, or diced spam. Wrap up into burritos then wrap in wax paper then put in a large freezer bag (put in as many in a freezer bag as you can). Take out what you want and microwave. You don't have to worry about the foil and microwave. :)