Rooting Pussy Willow Branches
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Love being greeted by this flower vase full of pussy willow branches. (Photo by Charlotte Ekker Wiggins)
Rooting Pussy Willow Branches
Talk about doing double duty!
I found these pussy willow branches several weeks ago and brought them home with the intention of trying to root them for plant starts.
For many years I’ve had pussy willow shrubs on my short list of plants I want to add to my Missouri limestone hill garden. I am sure the drawings I saw as a child of little kittens springing from pussy willow branches has shaped my decision. Not that I expect that to happen, mind you, but I love the little fluffy soft buds that sit along the stems.
Last year I bought one on sale to mark the grave of my last cat, Margaret, who died just shy of being 21 years old. She was a constant companion, often injecting herself in the middle of whatever I was doing. I miss her dearly still, especially the places she would drape her tail. I once almost sewed her tail into a blouse I was mending. She waited right before I started sewing to drape her tail over the fabric in front of the sewing foot. Oh, it was deliberate, she was a master at it. It was her unique way of getting my attention!
These lovely pussy willow branches sat in my garage for a couple of days until the weather turned colder. Knowing full well they would not survive outside, I decided to keep them inside in water to see if they would sprout roots. Not having a good place to set them aside, I placed them in a nice vase and made the pussy willow branches into the centerpiece of a coffee table. And they look stunning.
I took these pictures just before I changed the water in the vase.
Pussy willow branches in a flower vase waiting for roots to sprout. (Photo by Charlotte Ekker Wiggins)
I change the water every other day. It gives me a good opportunity to see if any roots are starting to sprout at the end of the stem’s growing nodes.
Roots should sprout from the growing nodes at the end of the stems. (Photo by Charlotte Ekker Wiggins)
If they do sprout, I have pots ready to get the rooted starts into soil so they have time to grow before May, when they will get moved outside.
If nothing grows, I am still enjoying the pussy willows as a centerpiece.
And believe it or not, neither one of my current two cats have yet to knock it over.
Charlotte
