Since Mulberry rooting success varies, I thought it might be useful to tap the wisdom of the crowd to get a ballpark on success rates for different cultivars. So if you have mulberry rooting successes and failures, and are willing to share, please participate in our survey…
The dwarf ever-bearing variety roots very easily for me.
I have tried Pakistan a few times with less success. They seem to take longer to form roots than the dwarf ever-bearing.
Thanks for the info Stan. I’ll try rooting dwarf everbearing next year.
This year I did have success with Maple Leaf, Florida Giant, Buluklu, Maui, and Tehama. Tons of failures though… Wellington, Collier, Kaester, and Hunzi Black didn’t work out for me.
Details, please.
In my experience, there’s a huge difference in rooting oercentages for midsummer cuttings and dormant-season collected cuttings.
I’ve had virtually ZERO success with dormant cuttings, but I’ve not tried them with bottom heat.
That is my experience as well… lower success with dormant cuttings. For dormant cuttings, I root them in the same way I root figs. 4"x9" tree pot with moist (not wet) Promix BX (60%Peat40%Perlite works for me too). Rooting hormone and bottom heat. Because our environment is relatively dry, I usually wrap the tops with parafilm. This year I’m experimenting on the ones that root quickly with smaller pots and not wrapping with parafilm.
ive tried several times to root I.E and graft it to my alba. none took. i read somewhere to score the bark below a new graft on mulberry to improve chances of it taking. that didnt work either. anyone have luck grafting I.E?
Sure. Most all the mulberries I have, including IE, I’ve grafted or t-budded onto seedling rootstock
I just do a simple bark graft…and I do a couple of partial girdling slices in the bark below the graft.
i used a cleft graft after the tree started leafing out. guess I’ll have to try bark grafting. how was your sucess rate? did you score the bark below the graft? this is on a 3in caliper unnamed M. Alba. should i cut it back to its 2 main branches or leave a few nurse branches?
A friend of mine into mulberries more than me taught me how he does it.
Right after fruiting has stopped take a cutting on semi-hardwood cuttings. Put cuttings in glass with water near a window but not direct light for a week changing water daily. When you change the water soak the top portion of the cutting and repeat. Do this for 7 days. On some you may see roots form, on some you may not.
On week 2 put cuttings in damp soil. and put back in the window without direct sunlight.
Week 6 inspect roots.
I have had success with everything that he has sent me. Some cuttings taking a week or 2 in transit. I did lose a couple but he said could be it was too late after that branch stopped fruiting.
His theory is that after all the energy needed to make fruit stops, energy is sent and stored for new growth…so the energy stored in the cuttings is high for rooting.
Im sure that there are lots of other methods but this one works for me.
i have a 3in. caliper 7ft Northrop i tried to graft I.E onto last spring after you told me Northrop was only fair tasting. that didnt take either. I’d rather graft to a existing tree than rooting cuttings and waiting 4-5 yrs for fruit.
It’s early summer and I just got some cuttings from a wild mulberry that looks to be from a very old tree from my place of employment (I work for a 128-acre education and research farm) that has EXCELLENT characteristics. The berries are HUGE for being wild (the berries are consistently about 2 inches long) fat, sweet and juicy and have been bearing for the last 4 weeks and appear to have no less than 2 more weeks of future bearing.
I decided to try to graft a cutting onto a wild one I have growing on my property and I stripped the rest and stuck them in water on my counter. I will see what happens. I am planning to go back and get some more after it stops bearing and then again when it goes dormant.
Does anyone have any updates on the ones you’ve rooted?
@dingdongsgarden
Hi Mark,
The varieties you’re having good success with all appear to be cultivars of M. alba, whereas the Pakistan is M. macroura, a quadraploid species.
I received some dormant hardwood cuttings of Illinois Everbearing, Pendula (weeping), Tehama, and Middleton(an Australian cultivar) from UDSA in winter of 2020. I kept them in a refridgerator until March then stuck them ,using rooting hormone, in an unheated garage with bottom heat and good average humidity. By May I took them off the heat and moved them into a warmer porch, stored in a plastic transparent box to keep the humidity up. They all put out top growth but had not shown any sign of rooting. By July they were in the box in a shaded area outside, no further growth, but signs of rooting.
All the Tehama rooted, as I would expect since that one has M. nigra in it’s breeding. Pendula and IE were each about 50% successful, and Middleton did not root at all. I only used hardwood cuttings as they were all that was offered, but my experience with softwood and semihardwood cuttings is much closer to 100 %.
When sap first starts going. Scratch the bottom all over and stab. I find that the bigger sticks work far better. Bigger the better. Those were IE. I stabbed a few Pakistans this year but they all failed.
