Plants are really cool organisms for one feature - they can quite easily reproduce themselves from only a couple of cells. This is called totipotency.
This gives the gardener additional options for making the environment greener - you may take a piece of the plant growing in a Click and Grow, and with enough luck it can grow new roots and start a second life. You can plant the new “clones” in your garden or give them to your friends. And if you wish, you can call the whole procedure cloning - the offspring will be genetically identical to the parent.
This works almost flawlessly with our Painted Nettle. Here are some simple steps to help you achieve this.
Start with a full grown plant (at least 5-6 pairs of leaves).
Cut the plant with a sharp knife. The cut part should have at least 3 - 4 pairs of leaves.
Remove the bottom pair of leaves from the cut part. The plant should have at least 4 leaves remaining.
Put the plant to a glass or jar of water. Just like you would do with a common rose.
Put the plant in a light spot, but away from direct sun - the plant doesn’t have roots yet, so it can’t take up water that easily and may wilt.
Wait for 2 to 3 weeks and check if new roots have appeared.
If you see roots with a length of at least 0.5 cm, you may transplant the plant.
Congrats! You have successfully cloned a plant. Let it grow larger, and if you wish you can clone the same plant again. You can use this method to multiply the plants with the best colours - they will stay the same. If you have luck the first time, you can try to use smaller and smaller pieces of the plant. The smaller the piece the more duplicates you can get from one plant.
Hope you’ll have fun with this!
Let us know which plants you have successfully cloned and share your results!