Nance - from something I wrote & left here almost exactly a year ago: I don't think it's accurate to pitch a particular brand or type of rooting hormone because different plant species respond to different chemicals, whether we are cloning hardwood, summer wood, or herbaceous/tip cuttings. Even though it's generally true that the most effective concentration levels normally vary and can be roughly grouped by the 3 types of cuttings you mentioned, the most effective chemical to use also varies and can be much more important than concentration levels; so, it is a combination of the concentration AND the choice of chemical + type of cutting and time of year that actually determines the effectiveness of a rooting chemical or the best choice. The rooting aids are synthesized forms of the plant hormone/growth regulator 'auxin'. Indole butyric acid (IBA) and naphthalene acetic acid (NAA) are the two most common chemicals that have been found to be reliable in the promotion of rooting in cuttings. IBA is widely applied in general use because it is non-toxic to most plants over a wide range and promotes root growth in a large number of plant species. Some plants respond better to either IBA or NAA, some respond to ONLY one or the other, some may have a toxic reaction to one but not the other which will lead to poor or no growth and actually, mortality; and some respond best to combinations of both chemicals, or to other variations of either IBA or NAA based on K (potassium). Both IBA and NAA are commonly available in talc or in liquid formulations of varying concentrations. I do lots of propagating of several hard-to-root species, but only use a rooting aid occasionally for the most difficult. As a generalization, you should know on a per plant basis which chemical and concentration is most apt to be effective before applying it. I have found it mostly unnecessary. Learning a little about the cultural conditions cuttings prefer and some other tricks (like methods of wounding) along with cleanliness will add more to what it takes to be successful at propagating (plants) than rooting aids (except in the very hard to root plants). Al

Pug, it was about a week for those roots. Jsainz, it does not say that it has rooting hormones in it, but it does say not to use with rooting hormones. I mispoke - it's best used with softwood cuttings and leaf cuttings. Does say on the box that the gel doesn't need to be washed off, but because I plant in hydroton I probably still will wash it off. Put a couple of other cuttings in it- thomsonii and sadly I can't remember what the other one is even after looking at the leaf again!

The slime is pretty common in water rooting, I think it's called mucky film or something quaint like that but like everyone has said, just rinse it off every few days when you change the water. I've had great success with rooting in water, I've had some spectacular fails too. The big game changer for me was actually changing the water and rinsing the film off. I didn't do it for years and easily 75% of my plants trying to root in water rotted. I'm currently experimenting with cuttings from an ancient hearty pothos using a rooting hormone in water. Seems a bit counterintuitive but it appears to be working nicely and almost halved the time it normally takes for the nodes to root out.

Hi 10 Months ago someone stole my 6ft swiss cheese from my lobby, and last night I found it dumped!! But the poor thing is in a bad way. It only has 3 leaves shared between 2 main stems. I was going to air layer the top of the stems using root powder and sphagum moss. But is it possible to just take cuttings from the stem and use a rooting gel? I want to have as many chances as possible, and also wanted to try and avoid keeping this 6ft tall "stem" and huge pot in my living room for around 2 months until the air layering rooted! Any advice would be greatly appreciated, I don't want to lose George ;-(