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Vegetative Annual Propagation: Osteospermum
By admin | November 6, 2007
We use overhead mist delivered through our boom to propagate all our unrooted cuttings and today we stuck a few hundred trays , the majority of which were Osteospermum. I find that Osteo’s are often a challenge to root but, as with most unrooted cuttings, it all depends of the quality of the cuttings and the management of the stock. I always use rooting hormone for 
Osteo’s as I feel it improves the uniformity of the rooting process and
speeds it up a day or two. They seem to be sensitive to excess moisture, so the proper amount of mist is crucial. Too wet and they will rot quickly. Too dry and they will lose too much moisture and this will set the rooting process back a few days and create a more uneven crop. We should see roots within 10-12 days and by then we’ll have turned off the mist at night and really started to ween the crop. It’s also time to put out fungicide spray now that we are finished sticking for the week.
Topics: Osteospermum |
November 15th, 2007 at 7:38 pm
Have you had downy mildew on you osteos? This year we had a lot of trouble with downy on Soprano Compact Purple (PW) - so much that they had to be thrown out. However, the other cultivars we grow our fine. Any thoughts?
November 16th, 2007 at 3:14 pm
We had trouble with downy last year in our Bracteantha, Coleus and Perilla Magilla. I’ve seen it before on Osteos. I use Aliette, Stature DM, and Allude for Downy. Heritage is pretty good too. I’ve found that Ball and Dummen have the best Osteos but it’s been a few years since I’ve grown the other varieties.