so far i have been using peat pot method at cup stage. it works very well for me. usually, once i see few roots outside of the peat pot, it's sure that they will live. but i'm thinking what is the difference that makes the peat pot method work so well for me. there has to be another method that works as well and don't need ordering 50 peat pot very spring.

how do you do your cup stage? just put rooted cutting in the cup with soil/perlite? or something different? i have tried few with just soil mix without the peat pot, and the result wasn't as high as peat pot method.

Pete, I am trying rafed method. 1. Using the sp moss and placing in Uline small bag and then into the bubbled envelope and 2. I am trying rockwool and then into the envelope. I have also rooted some in the small Uline bag, 50/50 Pro Mix/perlite and then into
a 32 oz clear cup which should allow them to stay there for a longer time.

My cup stage is done the minute I see roots on a cutting.  If the roots are tangled in the sphagnum, I don't worry.  I plant the sphagnum along with the roots.  I figure they will sort it out!  I fill the cup 1/4 full with DAMP peat/perlite, then hold the cutting in the middle, and fill the rest of the bottom cup.  Then I place the top clear cup over that and secure with masking tape.  The cups have holes for drainage and air.  Since roots like it dark, I put foil around the bottom cup or stick the entire thing in another opaque cup.    Mine look like this.



Suzi

Looks great, Suzi!  Quite a plant factory you have there.

I put a gritty style mix in a bag with the cutting a la Jon's new style.  Lately I've used a 52 oz clear gas station cup or cut off 1 qt milk bottle to load up with loosely packed damp sphagnum and a few morsels of finer organic material for humic acid.  Once I did a bed of damp sphagnum under the cutting and covered it with gritty mix (it had to go mostly horizontal) and they all worked.

Thanks to all the generous members I have enough cuttings to try the DesertDance "Suzi" method and the FrozenJoe "Joe" method.

Wow Suzi, you've got a fig tree jungle going there.

Suzi, do you leave the top cup on until it is up-potted into the next size cup/pot or do the plants out grow
the need for the green house and humidity?

Mike,  Sorry for my late response.  We are on a little mini vacation at a ski lodge in the high sierras.  The top cup has air holes, and I start loosening it and leaving it off for increasing amounts of time.  I also mist periodically once I pot them into their final destination.  They get plenty of light where they are because of the glass bricks on the west side of the house, and sometimes the shoots in the rooting sphagnum look sick yellow, and it's fun to watch them go green when they get in true light.

Suzi

Suzi, thanks, Enjoy your mini vacation. What area are you skiing? Mine will be under lights when they get going with some leaves.