Central Texas gardener John Dromgoole, for Backyard Basics, teaches all he knows about propagating cuttings and dividing plants in this 5 minute video. John is a man with a dark past! He used to “steal and borrer” cuttings when he could not afford to go out and buy all the plants he wanted. That’s how he learned the tricks of the trade.

Watch how he takes cuttings from the various plants and places them carefully in a 50/50 potting soil and perlite mix. He identifies plants such as geraniums, coleus, wandering jew, impatiens, strobilanthes and begonias as good candidates for cuttings. But the message John sends out is that taking cuttings from any plant and trying to propagate them is worth a shot. That’s why he keeps that dinky little knife in his pocket when he goes to the garden center…

Young SprinklerDaddy over at YouTube sums up the difference between spray and drip irrigation quite nicely:

SPRAY IRRIGATION Here a spray head is attached to a pipe for widespread water about 6′ to 12′ in all directions. “This method is good for watering a large bed of flowers or perennials that are all the same size,” says SprinklerDaddy. And lawns, he might have added. It is not suitable for a bed where there are different sized plants as the larger shrubs tend to block the water and the small shrubs get nothing.

DRIP IRRIGATION SprinklerDaddy really likes drip irrigation. He describes it as “cool.” He says: “This is for localized type of watering where you want to get water to the root of each shrub. There is no blocking out of smaller plants and no wasted water. It is a really good option when mulching. Once you have put down the bark or rocks, lay the pipes on top and cover with mulch. No need to dig a trench for the pipes.” And no need to watch the 1 min, 48 sec video either. All you will see is a talking head repeating what I have written above.

Somewhere down in Texas one winter, a man looked at the camera to tell us about the two types of irrigation you can use for your raised garden bed. According to the man with the winter grass stretching out behind him, compliments of ExpertVillage and YouTube, you can have Precision Button Irrigation (for directing water to a specific area) and Laser Drip Irrigation (for soaking a wide area).

Button irrigation involves small pipes leading off a main hose with a button at the base to control the flow of dripping water. Laser irrigation is a long, thin pipe with laser holes drilled all over it allowing water to leak all over the required area. If you want a short visit down south for some contrasting visuals and some very basic information, spend 1 minute, 53 seconds checking out Mr. “Lone Star” Irrigation.

Here’s the real deal on pruning a rose bush. It’s easy! At least one Nick Federoff on Revver makes it looks easy, and he takes only 1 min and 43 seconds doing so. Maybe it’s the Rasputin beard that imparts a sense of confidence in the viewer.

Anyway, Nick calls roses “one of America’s most beloved plants.” Yeah, and the rest of the globe, too. But he cautions that if you want beautiful flowers in spring, summer and fall you are going to have to prune those bushes right.

Nick applies his “3 Point Rule” when pruning roses and they make a bunch of sense. ONE Cut it knee-high, which is about 12 to 16 or 18 inches.
TWO Put your hand palm upward and form a cup shape. That’s how you want the pruned rosebush to look, with three to five main branches cupped around a hollow. The knuckles represent buds, which should face outward like your knuckles. Cut away the excess internal growth to create the hollow, airy space where the new rosebush will thrive. THREE Prune the roses diagonally about a 1/4 inch above the outward facing bud.

Oh, Nick adds you should use a good bypass pruner, availabe at your local nursery or garden centre. ADDITIONAL POINT FROM ME: Wear gardening gloves when pruning roses.

It’s David Epstein of GrowingWisdom.com fame again,this time giving a short (2 min 25 sec) springtime brief on how to prune a rose bush. Here is a useful quick lesson in something that is reputed to be difficult but is really quite easy. Tools are important: David uses gloves (rose bushes can be incredibly thorny) and using clean prune shears (you don’t want diseases spreading from one plant to another through your garden equipment).

David is very encouraging about the act of pruning. He says, “It’s really hard to mess up a rose bush!” Look for the buds on the vertical branches. Leave three or four buds on a branch and prune the stem at an angle about 1/4 inch above the last bud. (Those buds are going to form the lateral branches later on.) Then you prune the bush into a vase shape, making it nice and open for air flow. This discourages disease, says David.

Clever tip: David packs the cut branches in a pile pointing in the same direction so they can be lifted and disposed of easily once you are done. Oh, and after pruning he gives the rose bush a little fertilizer snack of 8:8:8 to promote spring growth.