My method for air-layering that worked even in a hot dry summer

Trav · July 27, 2026, 2:44am

I tried a variety of methods and there was a pattern that emerged in what works and what’s important.

I tried the sliced bottle method, the wrapped bag method, and the hotdog buns method, which was my favorite for both speed and the ability to open it without breaking the roots, so that’s a win win.

Simply said the hotdog bun method is: take a bag, preferably a bigger Ziploc bag about half filled with wet peat or potting mix, close the bag, shake and squeeze the peat down and wrap the end around and tape it tightly in place, then slice through the bag into the peat and open it like a hotdog bun, place it around the branch, with the top just above the highest wound in the branch, and tape the ends in place (later that will prevent twisting and breaking roots off) then wrap it all tightly with cellophane wrap and tape the ends again to make sure it doesn’t unwrap in the wind, and then wrap it in aluminum foil, or at least newspaper if it’s not too exposed to full sun.

I also tried putting plastic containers with lids or bottles slit lengthwise over the branch but these were both difficult to pack and wrap so that moisture wouldn’t escape and difficult to unwrap without damaging roots. With the empty hydrogen peroxide bottle I used I didn’t use aluminum foil and obviously that was fine, but it did seem to root rather late.

How to prepare the branch: cut a ring if bark off the branch at least 1½” of the bark off all the way around, and then scrub the cambiums of very well, probably the best method is to grip lightly with changed locks and spin them around and around scraping everything off of both ends close to the bark, then I dusted it with rooting hormone and wrapped it up.

I didn’t notice any benefit to making extra wounds or cutting a zig zag edge on the side that the roots would develop (the top side of course) or making extra wounds above the girdled portion.

Most of them root as long as the cambiums do not reconnect, if the cambiums connect, you usually don’t get any roots.
This is all mulberry, except the two pears.

These are the two photos of the Clapp’s Best pear.

(Note this has worked for me on mulberry and pear and worked poorly on Cortland and Ida Red apple, but it’s very dependent on cultivar, I believe)

treefrog1 · July 27, 2026, 4:31pm

@Trav thank you for the informationon air layering. I read somewhere (not this forum) that it can be helpful on the previous year to wrap a wire around the branch where the air layer will take place. It will cause a bulge to grow there. The next year when you do the air layer, remove the wire and that scar from the wire is your uppermost line to cut and remove the bark. The wire is supposed to bottleneck the auxins as they travel down the branch.

I’m in the process of air layering a lilac bush, I read about this step the night before I did the air layer, so I have not done it before and can’t talk from experience. Supposedly lilac are difficult to air layer, maybe I will go out with the wire and wrap a few branches for next season.

Trav · July 27, 2026, 6:41pm

I went to a Nut Growers’ Association meeting and they had a studied method of stooling and they were putting zip ties on the bases of the suckers, then mounding up aged sawdust or something like that over them and letting them sprout roots, their findings ultimately were that if the zip ties didn’t break it worked well, but most of the zip ties they used were not strong enough to strangle/girdle even the young shoots, so a wire is probably needed especially on a tough branch, and probably a thicker wire so that it squeezes instead of cutting through. Maybe the wire and aluminum foil wrap would be good for tough-to-airlayer or very valuable varieties that you can’t afford to lose a branch off of…..like Stern’s Medlar, I hope I’ll get a piece of that soon.

themulberries · July 27, 2026, 7:07pm

The hot dog bun method is my go-to! I’m impressed you rooted pears this way too. I have some air layers on a couple of citrus and some plums.

Mulberries and figs work great with air layers. Citrus require several months if not most of the growing season to succeed. I remember an air layer we put on some sort of cypress which took over a year to root!

dogpatch · July 27, 2026, 8:34pm

I think pears and peach are very easy to air layer, apple seems to take longer but are pretty successful. The only ones that I have done that I didn’t have any luck with were sweet cherries and Oxhart. I haven’t tried Paw Paw yet but I would think they should be fairly easy too because of the way they sucker.

Trav · July 27, 2026, 10:04pm

They do! But I should admit that I cut down my mulberry airlayers way too late and they were frozen solid, so when I planted them in the ground I’m not sure if the roots were frozen off or not, but it was a relatively dry spring, and it didn’t make it, I hope the one I gave my sister did, but I don’t know, she’s too busy to check her orchard.