As stated earlier when the young plant has made sufficient root development for you to see the roots starting to run around the bottom of the pot you will need to think about moving them into a larger pot.

This stage is known as 'potting on'. It was originally thought and much was written about it, that you should at all times move the plant to a pot no bigger than 1 inch more than the pot size you are already using i.e. when moving from the 2.5" pot you should go no larger than a 3.5" pot.

This view has somewhat changed over the years since I first wrote this booklet, and now although I wouldn’t advocate putting a cutting into a 5” pot, neither would I say that you cannot pot up a plant currently in a 3.5” pot into a 6” pot.

You don’t want the plant to stand proud or be to submerged in it’s new pot, well not at this stage anyway), with compost and fill in around the sides quite firmly. You can use a small stick or a plant label to help you do this.

When you remove the smaller pot from inside the other you will be left with an imprint of the small pot and you can now check that no air pockets have been left.

This complete filling of the pot with compost is something that you cannot be sure of if you try to fill in the soil around the root ball by just placing the plant straight into a larger pot and filling in the gap.

Next take the plant out of it’s pot and very carefully place it into its new larger pot, you don’t want to disturb the compost that is up the sides of the pot.

When this has been done, gently tap the pot on the bench to settle the compost. No firming or if you feel better for it very gentle firming should be required.