Myrtle cuttings in Autumn
Myrtle, Myrtus communis. I have great problems with Myrtle cuttings, they seem to me to take a long time to take, half die and the successful cuttings take a long time to grow. I bought a mother plant three years ago at the Autumn Prades flower festival. the plant is now quite well established, but still has never flowered, or and therefore never given any fruit.
In theory Myrtle, Myrtus communis, will grow to five feet tall, I hear people make hedges of the stuff. Well maybe by the time I am 70 or so. In the meantime it is an attractive small bush on our terrace. Despite it being originally from the Mediterranean basin I have never seen it growing in the wild here, may be a little further south in Spain, and definitely in Sardinia, where it is the basis of mirto rosso and mirto bianco. It is also used to flavour pork dishes, which courted my fancy, and the Catalans use it to flavour baked figs 
which also appealed. I once had cooked figs in red wine with cinnamon ice cream which was absolutely delicious.
So I decided to take some Myrtle cuttings now, and then take a second set next Spring and plot the success rate of the two to see which is more successful. I took the bog standard approach, pot fill of Orgasyl, heavily watered, then a bunch of 8 cm cuttings, stripped of all but the top leaves, buried up to their necks. they will go on the growing table against the house which offers some protection against the Winter frosts and is handy to water. When I have taken the Spring cuttings, I will post an update on which gives the better results
For more information on Myrtle
