I had an email from Robyn asking me how to make a bottle cloche.
It's an excellent way of making a mini greenhouse out of stuff you would normally throw away.
So - take a plastic drinks bottle. The size will depend on what you're going to sow - you can use a small one for individual seeds or to protect plants or a large one if you're sowing a few seeds or rooting some cuttings.
Cut round the middle of the bottle with a pair of scissors or a sharp knife,
Make a little slit in the top half so that you can fold it slightly to fit inside the bottom half.
Now - from here, you can fill the bottom with soil, sow your seeds or put in your cuttings, water and then fit the top on.
This will serve as a mini propogator.
However, you can also use both halves outside to warm the soil before planting out your herbs, vegetables or flowers.
Just push the bottle into the soil where you're going to plant and if you leave it a while, the soil will heat up to get your plants or seeds off to a great start as the soil will be nice and warm.
You can also use your bottle cloche to protect plants when they first go outside - I would pop one over small tender plants at night until all risk of frost has gone.
Your bottle cloche could also be used during the winter to protect tender plants - I have some agave in my garden - the large ones I cover with bubble wrap, but the small ones I have covered over with bottle cloches and they've been great.
Of course, layering will work for any plant, but this method is an excellent way of getting more plants without risk to the parent plant.
Take a shoot from the plant you want to increase and put it to the ground - don't pull and tug at it, just lay it gently and naturally.
Take a sharp knife and at the point where the stem will touch the soil, very gently scrape away a piece of bark.
Pin the shoot to the ground - use a bent piece of wire - an opened out staple would do for most new shoots.
Cover the stem with soil and give it a good watering.
Leave the plant until you see good growth and then check that it's rooted by scraping away a bit of the soil.
Cut it away from the parent plant and you can then transplant it.
The best time to do this is in Spring when the plants are in full growth - I leave them until the autumn or even until the next year.
It's an excellent way of propogating - if you're looking at selling herbs for profit, you could easily root lots of plants this way and you'll have instant stock to sell the following year.
