well.. with so much failure this winter, i'm going to do something different from this point on.

i'm, sort of, kind of, following old method of rooting.

first i'm going to run a test run when the UCD cuttings are in. i'm going to start them all with baggie like i have been, but i'm going to skip the cup all togather. i'll be going straight to 1 gal containers.

i'll be putting cuttings vertically into the soil mix up to the very last 1 node. then i'm going to leave them in the garage and just neglect them until they need water. i'll be doing this to one cutting of all the varieties i'm getting to check on the success rate.

i think 7 deuce (jason) is doing this already.

what i'm thinking is this will acculumate the cuttings to the outside enviornment much faster. and i won't have to worry too much about being too dry in the house. if it works, this will cut out lot of extra work for me.

I skip the cups and go into 1 gallon pots also Pete. I've been using the new bag method and try to wait until the roots look like a bowls of noodles and then pot them up gently.

I really think the key point you made was to "neglect them until they need water". I used a moistened 50% potting mix with 50% perlite and that seems to be working for me in CT. 

yep...it makes sense

I'll do everything different like you because I'll finally have land!  The fungus gnats have been a huge problem this year, but not outside!  Just the ones in the cups inside!  I like the idea of direct to one gallons, and let nature take it's course!  I have several rooted in cups, and will transfer asap to one gallons.  They are not impervious to fungus gnats, but it's warm enough here now to put them outside.  Most of my container figs are already showing new green leaves.

Suzi

One thing I am going to do.... is when i receive cuttings in the fall I'm going to soak them, dry them off, then wrap in saran and put in the fridge until about NOW.. lol

I had great success rooting only to see many die much later on to rot or knats. Without pesticides here in Canada its hard to control them.

I use to put cuttings in moss then when they have roots I would put them into 4 inch pots.
Now I use the root riot cubes and when I see roots they go directly into pots.
No need for cups anymore. The roots are not disturbed in any way so it results in less stress to the cuttings.
If they have no leaves at this point I put them into the bin until I see a bud starting to swell then I remove it and put it into the light.
If the cutting has leaves I put it into the bin for a couple of days then take it out and introduce it to the light slowly and watch to see that it doesn't wilt. I had two wilt this year but they made a good recovery.
Next year I'm going to be using the cubes again exclusively to root cuttings. Hopefully the new cubes that Jack mentioned about will be available for the larger cuttings. I bet the large cubes would be good to do air layers with.

Pete, that's how I do it except for the garage part.  I get much better success with bottom heat.  When it's 65 degrees in my baggie box inside the bags it's 59, presumably from evaporation.  They root much more slowly and that gives the gnats time.  With bottom heat they root more quickly.

bob,

that's why i usually root in the spring. my study is around 70-80. they root quick. but thing is they root quick, but they dry quicker and they rot quicker too.

during the spring, that's not an issue. since it roots quick, i move them outside quicker with fresh air and sun. but this time around doing winter rooting, not of my cuttings in cup stayed indoor. controling the moisture has been an issue. don't get me wrong, some are still going very strong, but i'm sure i lost Noire de Caromb and that bites me big time.

at the start the the fall, i got some rooted cuttings from very generouns members. i put them directly into 1 gal container and left them in the garage. they are not putting on the leave and doing very well. they were not full grown plants. just cuttings with good roots.

since that was the case, i moved some of my cuttings with good roots and put them into garage, but they all died. i think the garage temp wasn't warm enough.

so what i've done last week as i put one Panache cutting that was in baggie directly into 1 gal container and put it in garage. that's the test subject. if that one makes it, rest will have some chance.

what i think has happened was that the branches and leaves that were grown inside is not used to lower temp and they are getting damaged. if they branches and leave are grown in cold temp in garage, they might have better chance.

also, the air temp should be lower than the temp side of the pot, so it might promote root growth before the top. just taking wild guess. but if it works, it will take about 70% of my cutting work with it.

this winter, the lowest we got was something like 20 degrees at night. that's still above freezing in my garage. and during the day time, lowever it got was also 20.. with sun hitting the south side all, the side of the garage was well over 35. i'm hoping that will do.

i'm sticking to spring rooting for anything very special from here on. that means i'll have to go back to finding storage solutions. it seems good varieities are more available in fall.

my failure this winter has been mostly due to moisture control once the cuttings were in the cup.

In my experience,
if you keep them in a high humidity environment for too long,
they acclimate to that extreme and do not adjust properly to lower levels.

While its important to start them at higher levels,
after leaf development,
I like to reduce the percentage weekly,
and maintain it at no more than 10-15% above ambient humidity,
this way when you remove them from your bin,
there is little effect on the plant.