Propagating lavender – easy way to grow your own lavender

Do you want to have a beautiful garden on a budget? Learn how to propagate lavender, easily and cheaply with this no-nonsense method.

Beautiful bee-friendly lavender, all propagated for free from an old, straggly lavender plant!

When I was a child, one of my favourite things to do, apart from day-dreaming about becoming a crab-fisher-woman (which I still occasionally do!) was helping my mother in the herb-garden. We had a kitchen garden at home growing fruit, potatoes, beans, courgettes etc for the kitchen, but it was the communal herb-garden that had the allure for me. It had herbs, some bog standard ones and some quite exotic ones. And it also had the most fascinating characters, spanning from vibrant, exotic and down to earth, that you could find on our little island. An afternoon spent in that little herb-garden was always an afternoon well spent!

The small group of plant enthusiasts met twice weekly, to chat and weed mostly, or weed and chat, whatever tickled their fancy. The herb garden is located near the small island’s main ferry port in the garden of an old smuggler’s den. It was, and still is, a beautiful setting. Now, the old smuggler’s haunt features a bakery and a popular café and bar. The herb garden is still there, and guests to the island can take the short stroll from the ferry and enjoy a fika (Swedish for coffee and something sweet, usually a cinnamon bun) in the herb-garden while watching the island life go by at a rather leisurely pace.

Propagating lavender is child’s play

When we were young, however, it was just a ramshackle house, housing the state-owned electrical company on one side and the green fingered friends of the other side. Not too many tourists sipping on coffee and eating prawn sandwiches. To bring in some cash for new plants etc, the herb garden group made and sold calendula balms, infused vinegars and its speciality lavender plants.

Us children were often put in charge of making the lavender plants. This process included propagating, weeding, and potting up the little plants. I loved this job, and to this day it is one that I thoroughly enjoy! I think it was the fragrance of the leaves as they were handled that made me enjoy it so much. As well as my fascination for how willingly the tiny cuttings made new little roots and became beautiful flowering plants so quickly.

My rescue dog Bonnie loves rolling in fragrant plants such as Lavender and curry plant. Especially when there are no bees on them!

Lavender for bees

Lavender is of course a much beloved plant for our honeybees and many other insects. Bees are said to be very keen of blue and purple flowers. It is also said that bees are attracted to the fragrance of lavender. Flowering profusely around mid summer where other food sources are sometimes scarce, lavender provides an abundance of nectar for bees to feed on. They also collect pollen from lavender.

There are many lavender species available, and perhaps the best one for bees is the classical garden favourite Lavandula Angustifolia. (Also known as L. Officinalis and English Lavender.) This is because it blooms either continuously throughout the summer or multiple times. To attract bees, lavender is best planted in groups, rows or blocks. This will make it easier for the bees to find the area. And they can therefore more successfully communicate the location to their fellow bees through the ‘waggle dance’.

No nonsense method of propagating lavender

The herb-garden way of propagating lavender is completely no-nonsense. It is also very successful and so easy that you can let the kiddos do it if you please. It is miles away from complicated  selecting of plant material, sterilising secateurs, using rooting powder and heated rooting mats that you can read about if you google ‘Propagating lavender’ today. You can do it without any tools at all, and there are no pots required either! And very little, if any, mollycoddling of the little plant babies. It’s a win-win for the busy and cash strapped gardener!

When I moved into my cottage, there were two straggly lavender plants in the garden. They were very woody and completely neglected, and most definitely on the way out. Before they died, I managed to propagate hundreds of lavender plants using this simple method.

How to propagate Lavender from hardwood cuttings

1. After flowering, when you do the hard pruning in the autumn or winter, keep the plant material (hardwood cuttings*). Make sure it doesn’t dry out. (If you don’t have your own lavender plants to propagate from, you can ask friends and neighbours for some of their cuttings!) You can also use hardwood cuttings taken in spring for this propagation method.
2. Break or cut off non-flowering tips, about 7-10 cm long.
3. Pull off the leaves leaving the top 2-3 cm intact with the leaves on.
4. Prepare a spot in the garden where you can leave the plants for a year. Make sure the soil is weed and stone free and moist. Rake it over.
5. Insert the little twigs of lavender into the soil, 5-7 cm apart. Push them down so that only the part with the leaves is sticking up.
6. Firm the soil gently around the plant.

How to care for the cuttings

1. If the conditions are dry over the next few weeks, water sparingly once a week.
2. The cuttings should start producing roots after a few weeks or months. This depends on the conditions and when they were taken and placed in the soil.
3. Leave the plants grow where they are until they are ready to transplant.
4. You can pot up the baby lavender plants once they have rooted and have started growing. However, it is always best to leave them a while to make sure that the root system is developed properly.
5. The plants can also be left in situ until the autumn when they are larger and more robust. They can then be transplanted straight to their new place in the garden.

*Hardwood cuttings are the old growth of the plant. Soft wood cuttings are taken from the fresh green growth in spring. Lavender can also be propagated from softwood cuttings in spring, but it is more delicate process.

Pruning Lavender

Lavender should be cut back hard after flowering. It can be cut from autumn to spring. Cut back to at least 1/3 of the plant. Leave some green on the plant and do not cut all the way back to the old wood.

If you have a lot of lavender clippings over, they can be composted, or used for mulch in the garden. I usually save some to use for smoker fuel in my beekeeping smoker. It smells divine, and although it might not have a calming effect on the bees, it certainly does on me!

Read more about plants for pollinators: Plants for Bees – Hanna’s Bees (hannasbees.ie)

Thank you for reading, and as usual I welcome any comments or suggestions for future posts in the comment thread below!

/Hanna