Cuttings: random Q's from a newbie

Hi everyone,

After so many of my plants being scorched, I cut them back after the weather cooled down. I kept parts of the canes that still looked healthy and put them in a jar of water. The ends calloused and a week or so later, I planted them up into cutting mix and put them on the windowsill in the bathroom. Of 23, only 2 went black, and the rest have sprouted leaves and roots in their little cutting trays (4 weeks have passed) I have literally just been experimenting (read:making it up) and they seem to be alive/growing. They have had no special treatment except watering.

I've read so much about cuttings...a million different stories/methods. Most describe some king of greenhouse suggestion (from plastic bags to actual greenhouses). Also, advice about diameter (pencil size etc) and length varies so much. Is all this advice dependent on climate? Are my little cuttings just tricking me and will probably die? Is the suggestion on diameters to make for bigger plants or actually necessary? Am I making any sense at all?

Any tips or suggestions would be appreciated! I have not much clue what I'm actually doing! Thanks in advance, Tara

Tara, can you post some photos please.

As they are doing well at present I would not change anything, the bathroom is a good enviroment, as it is acting similar to a greenhouse/hothouse. As for thickness/length, the age of the wood has a lot to do with it. Think minature roses for a minute, most are cutting grown are started from about the thickness of a piece of wool with about four buds on it. Hope this little bit helps for now, will add more later.

A piece of wool, Dave ..that's very thin to support four buds?

John, upto 200 cuttings per seedling flat

We lost just about all of our cuttings in the persistent heat we have had. I guess we should have moved them into the shade by who expected 40 or more days in a row of +30 degrees heat.

That is except for our Comtesse de Labarthe. We struck about 70 and we now have about 60 or so all growing well . Not to sure what we are going to do with them.

David we manged to keep half a dozen of the "rustled" roses going. I will let you know what happens with these.

We have had a bit of rain lately (98mm on Monday followed by another 40mm early Tuesday morning) I think we lost about 15 or so roses that were mostly ones planted last year though a couple of old larger roses did not make it.

From Gary's post,

"We have had a bit of rain lately (98mm on Monday followed by another 40mm early Tuesday morning) I think we lost about 15 or so roses that were mostly ones planted last year though a couple of old larger roses did not make it."

Can we have some please.
Any thoughts of what the "rustled" roses might be ?

How is "noname" "bluhimeye" going ?