Supplies

• Ferns with spores

• Knife

• Piece of paper

• Pot

• Potting soil

• Gallon ziploc bag

Let's Do It!

1. July in North Carolina is a great time to find a fern with spores. Go into your garden or find a friend with a fern.

2. Flip the fern leaf over to reveal spores on the underside.

3. Using a knife, gently (and carefully!) scrape spores from the leaf onto a piece of white paper.

4. Fill a pot with potting soil.

5. Moisten the potting soil.

6. Sprinkle the spores from the paper onto the soil surface.

7. Put the pot into the plastic bag and place in indirect light.

8. Watch as new ferns will slowly emerge!

Love ferns? Watch Mark Weathington talk about the value of ferns in the home landscape!

Supplies:

• Sharp pruning shears

• Pot

• Potting soil

• Rooting hormone (optional)

• Gallon ziploc bag

Let's Do It!

1. Determine which plants you are interested in taking a cutting from. Check to see if the timing is right to take a cutting of your plant. This NC State Extension factsheet lists many ornamentals and what stage the plant should be in for the cutting.

2. Cuttings should generally consist of the current or past season’s growth. Avoid material with flower buds if possible. Remove any flowers and flower buds when preparing cuttings so the cutting’s energy can be used in producing new roots rather than flowers.

3. Take cuttings from healthy, disease-free plants, preferably from the upper part of the plant.

4. Cuttings from lateral shoots often root better than cuttings from terminal shoots.

5. Early morning is the best time to take cuttings, because the plant is fully turgid.

6. While terminal parts of the stem are best, a long shoot can be divided into several cuttings. Cuttings are generally 4 to 6 inches long.

7. Remove the leaves from the lower one-third to one-half of the cutting .

8. On large-leafed plants, the remaining leaves may be cut in half to reduce water loss and conserve space.

9. Treating cuttings with root-promoting compounds can be a valuable tool in stimulating rooting of some plants that might otherwise be difficult to root.

10. The rooting medium should be sterile, low in fertility, and well-drained to provide sufficient aeration. It should also retain enough moisture so that watering does not have to be done too frequently. Materials commonly used are coarse sand, a mixture of one part peat and one part perlite (by volume), or one part peat and one part sand (by volume).

11. Insert the cuttings one-third to one-half their length into the medium. Space cuttings just far enough apart to allow all leaves to receive sunlight.

12. Cover the cuttings with plastic and place in indirect light. Avoid direct sun.

13. Keep the medium moist until the cuttings have rooted. Rooting will be improved if the cuttings are misted on a regular basis.

14. Rooting time varies with the type of cutting, the species being rooted, and environmental conditions. Conifers require more time than broadleaf plants. Late fall or early winter is a good time to root conifers. Once rooted, they may be left in the rooting structure until spring.

Supplies

• Asiatic lily bulb - from your garden or local nursery

• Bleach - safety note: be careful when handling, avoid contact with your skin

• Vermiculite

• Gallon ziploc bag

Let's Do it!

1. Dig up a lily bulb from your garden with permission or obtain one from a mail-order nursery or your local nursery.

2. A lily is made up of scales attached to a basal plate where the bulb roots are formed. To scale a bulb, the overlapping scales are broken off at the base and not in the middle.

3. Pulled back gently on each scale and give it a slight twist so it will break cleanly away at the basal plate.

4. Take the first and possibly second row of scales (if bulb is large enough) and plant the remainder of the bulb back in the garden.

5. Soak scales in a 10 % bleach solution: 1 part bleach to 9 parts of water. Let them soak for about 10 minutes.

6. Rinse the scales off with cool running water.

7. Put your a cup or so of vermiculite into a plastic ziploc bag and lightly moisten it.

8. Add your scales into the vermiculite and place in a dark place for a month or so.

9. Once the scales have started to root, plant them ½ inch deep in potting mix.

Some seeds have really hard seed coats that protect them from germinating at the wrong time -- times when it might be too cold, too wet, or too dry. Tough seed coats can also protect seeds when they have been eaten by animals and go through their digestive tract.

Download the activity PDF

Supplies

• 2 Kentucky Coffeetree seeds

• Metal hand file (not a nail file)

• 2 Pots

• Potting soil

Let's Do It!

1. Fill your two pots to the top with potting soil.

2. Label one pot, "Control," and the other pot, "Treated."

3. Take one Kentucky coffeetree seed and plant them about 1-inch deep in the "control" pot.

4. Take the remaining seed and rub them on the file until you can see a small bit of seed. The seed coat is thick, so this might take some time. Be careful not to rub your fingers on the file.

5. Once you have nicked the seed coat of the seed, plant them 1-inch deep in the "treated" pot.

6. Water the pots until the potting soil is moist.

7. Place the pots in a sunny location and water as needed, likely every day.

8. Make a prediction about which seeds will germinate first.

Let's Talk about It!

1. What happened? Which seeds germinated first, "control" or "treated?"

2. Was your prediction right or wrong?

3. How long did it take for the seeds to germinate? Did all of the seeds germinate?

4. Where does Kentucky coffeetree usually grow? Why might it be important to the environment?

5. What are you going to do with the plants that germinated? How big do these trees get?

6. What other seeds need "treatment" to germinate?

Variation

1. You don’t have Kentucky coffeetree seeds? No problem. Use morning glory seeds instead.

2. Experiment to determine the best scarification method: hot water, sandpaper, vinegar and a control.

3. What did you find out? How long did it take for the seeds to germinate? Which treatment worked best?

Love the Kentucky coffeetree? Read more about it in this plant guide from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).