Lavender plants (Lavandula angustifolia) are often propagated by taking cuttings to produce new, cloned plants.
Describe how to clone a lavender plant by taking a stem cutting.
A commercial grower wanted to determine whether hormone rooting formulation Alpha or formulation Beta is more effective. The grower treated one cutting with formulation Alpha and one cutting with formulation Beta before planting them in identical compost. Both cuttings were grown under identical light intensity and temperature.
After 4 weeks, the grower measured the dry mass of roots produced by each cutting:
The grower concluded that formulation Alpha is more effective. A student commented that, although the experiment was valid, the single-replicate design means the results do not strongly support this conclusion.
Describe and explain how the grower could improve this investigation to have more confidence in the conclusion.
State three advantages of vegetative propagation (cloning) compared to growing plants from seeds in commercial horticulture.
