How to Make a Propagation Station With Test Tubes

You need three main supplies. A piece of lumber 1 inch thick and 2 inches wide, cut to the length you want. A coil of bare copper wire about 1/8 inch thick, stiff enough to hold a tube upright. And glass test tubes, one for every cutting you want to root. This board is 17 and a half inches long and holds five tubes. Have a drill, bits, tape and wire cutters on hand too.

Stand the test tubes along the board to work out the spacing before you drill. Give each one plenty of room. Your cuttings will spread out much wider than the tubes, and leaves that crowd each other do not sit nicely. Here the tubes are about 3 and a half inches apart, measured from the center of one to the center of the next. Mark each center with a pencil.

Clamp the board down and drill a 1 inch hole at each mark. The board is only an inch tall, so stop at about three quarters of an inch deep. That leaves a solid bottom and gives the tube a snug pocket to sit in without tipping over. A Forstner bit cuts a clean, flat hole. Check that a tube slides in and out easily.

Find a round object about the same width as your test tube, like a tool handle or a marker. Wrap the copper wire around it to form a ring, then bend both ends straight down so they become two long prongs. Getting a perfect circle is hard, and that is fine. No one looks that closely. Make one holder for each tube.

Lay a finished holder on the table and slide a test tube into the ring. The lip at the top of the tube should rest on the ring, with the prongs running down beside the glass. The wires here sit about an eighth of an inch from the tube, and the two prongs are about an eighth of an inch apart. Note those gaps for the next step.

Using the gaps you measured, mark two small holes behind each big hole, side by side. Drill them with a bit a hair wider than the wire. Techplant used a 9/64 inch bit for 1/8 inch wire. The wires sit a little loose in these holes, and that is fine. Gravity and the weight of the tube hold everything in place.

Decide how high you want each ring to sit around its tube. Because both holes are the same depth, you can lay the holder next to a tube and mark the prongs where they line up with the bottom of the glass. A strip of tape makes a handy marker. Cut the extra wire off at the mark with wire cutters. Repeat for every holder.

Push each holder's two prongs into their small holes so the rings stand in a row above the big holes. You can leave them dry fit like this if they feel snug. For a permanent build, add a drop of glue to the wire holes only. Never glue the test tube holes. You want the tubes to lift out freely for cleaning.

Slide each test tube down through its ring and into its hole. Then pour in water. Bottled or filtered water is a good choice because tap water can carry chlorine. When you propagate plants, plain water is all you want. Anything added can affect how the roots grow, or stop them from growing at all.

Drop a cutting into each tube so the stem sits in the water and the leaves rest above the ring. The slender tubes keep small cuttings from falling in or flopping to the side, which is the whole reason to use them over jars. Set the station on a bright windowsill or a desk. Then wait for the roots to show.