Propagating Native Plants
by Alec M. Blomberry & Betty Maloney
- Title: Propagating Australian Plants
- ISBN: 0-86417-613-9
- Format: Paperback
I have over 1,000 Diospyrus Geminata (scaly ebony) seedlings growing in my shade house (in used toilet rolls). I'd collected the seeds from the (delicious) fruit in late 2017 (they appear to fruit based on rainfall - no fruit in 2018) and they're all still rather small.
All the literature stated that they were slow growing. I may have been more dismissive of this than I needed to be.
I'm growing these for landscape scale planting, it's going to be a while between gathering the seeds (mid 2017) and planting the trees (maybe mid 2019).
So I needed to look into other forms of propagation and either cutting or aerial layering appear to be the way to go, as I already have large numbers of of mature Diospyros Geminata on our property or nearby.
The catch being that I know nothing of either cutting or aerial layering and in particular I want to do this at a reasonable scale (ie: possibly thousands).
So this is where Propagating Australian Plants comes in.
It's a fairly dry and academic read, that feels like it may be more of an introductory guide for botanic students than a lay person such as myself.
Despite being last published in 1994 by a publisher that no longer exists and having a distinct antique feel to it, the information within is crisp and concise with clear and helpful illustrations.
Highly recommended if you're starting to propagate natives as I am.
Although I wish you luck picking up a copy - I got mine from an Op Shop. At least the National Library of Australia appears to have a copy.