How to Grow Geraniums from Cuttings

Geraniums are good sellers at country markets, and they’re easy to root! Here’s our three easy steps to grow geranium cuttings.

1. Prepare the pots:

We put a few large leaves in the bottom of each pot and then fill with a mixture of soil, cow manure and wood ash. Water well.

Beautiful geraniums

2. Take geranium cuttings:

Next we cut stems about 10-15 cm (4-6″) long and strip off most of the leaves and all buds and flowers. Just keep 2 leaves at the very top of the geranium cutting.  Cut the bottom of the stalk at an angle and just below a leaf node.

Geranium stalks stripped of leaves and cut on an angle.

Poke cuttings down into the pot, 6-8 per pot. Make sure each pot only has cuttings from one geranium plant, and write the plant’s name or colour onto the pot.

Cuttings in a pot.

3. Keep cuttings moist:

Geraniums don’t like to be watered over the top as this causes rust. We put our pots into shallow trays or troughs and water into them.  The soil in the pots sucks up the moisture and it makes watering very easy!

These cuttings are in a trough with a timer.

Hint: it’s even easier if you have an automatic timer!

Geranium cuttings will usually take a few months to root. They root more quickly in summer than in winter.

Geranium cuttings in a meat tray.

When roots appear from the bottom of the pot, you know they’re ready to pot up separately.

Prepare pots as above and put 1 rooted cutting into each pot.  After 2 weeks they’ll be ready to sell or give away!


For more in depth info on taking cuttings check out this great article:

Geraniums make beautiful flower arrangements!

Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of them.  Luke 12:27