Worldwide Beekeeping
Sustainable Living => Gardening => Topic started by: Bakersdozen on February 13, 2024, 11:28:57 am
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Let me see what everyone thinks about this.
I just read, on social media that honey is a natural root stimulator and fertilizer. Never heard that before! The person posting said to 1. Dip the cut end in honey. 2. Then dip in rooting hormone. 3. Then you can water with honey water. Hmmmmm
Have you ever heard this before?
Why do you need to follow up with rooting hormone if honey is a rooting hormone?
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Why do you need to follow up with rooting hormone if honey is a rooting hormone?
Yeah, that's kind of telling to me. ;) Honey would probably be good as an anti-fungal and anti-bacterial, and the sugars could help give the plant a little boost, but I doubt there is a significant amount of actual plant rooting hormone in honey.
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I would say with the honey, you get twice as much root hormone to stick to the stem, therefore twice the rooting help.
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15th and iddee, those are two interesting thoughts.
I asked a fellow gardening beekeeper if she had ever heard of this and she sent me two links to read. In short, it sounds like it works for some species of plants but not others. Hibiscus was used in one study and it had a positive effect. www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/uhmg/news/V21-honey-rooting-Firth.pdf (http://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/uhmg/news/V21-honey-rooting-Firth.pdf)
https://ajabtr.smartsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/The-Effects-of-Honey-on-Root-Generation-in-Plant-Cuttings.pdf (https://ajabtr.smartsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/The-Effects-of-Honey-on-Root-Generation-in-Plant-Cuttings.pdf)