Allotments 4 All

3-4", Jeannine?  Near 2 are too small.

Smashing Tim looks good to me XX Jeannine

I have been spreading the word about taking tomato cuttings for years, they soon catch up too and are exactly like the host plant.

At first people did not believe it could be done but the tomato is one of the easiest plants to take cuttings from. I have taken huge ones of 10" which sprouted undetected, just to see if they would grow and they wilted a little but soon recovered. As soon as they are big enough to handle comfortably is fine and you do not need to snip or cut , just rip them off.

I take cuttings from geraniums and fuscias (which I can never remember how to spell) too. It can save a fortune with plant buying. To buy tiny plugs early of just one plant and use it for cuttings. I do the same with herbs when they get woody, I take a cutting from the tips. Rosemary, Thyme, and so on. There is not much to lose if the cutting does not take.

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Thank you Robert, I thought that was what I'd done - I shall go to the computers board and play around there!

I grow special varieties from seed but I still need Gardeners Delight and Sungold and for these it's a lot easier and cheaper to buy a couple of the biggest, earliest plants and take cuttings. If you can afford to take the top of a big plant as a cutting it accelerates the production of axil shoots.

Shoots taken in June or later don't need special treatment - you can even just trim the bottom leaves off and push them straight into moist soil.

If you find a really long shoot (or breakage) over 150mm  it's best to get most of it into the soil - you don't need to put it in vertically, you can lay it in a shallow drill as long as you mulch well - laying a brick over the buried bit works really well.

Cuttings have the same maturity as the parent plant - doesn't mean they won't be a bit later than the parent but late cuttings are always better than late seedlings.

Give it a go.