There was much excitement in my kitchen when healthy roots showed up on the bottom of a stem I whacked off from the little Royal Paulownia I've been nursing back to health for the past several months after having left it home alone while I had to be away for a month. That was before my new sprinkler system was installed so that I can go away guilt-free. The Empress Tree was pretty sad looking when I came back to find it all dried out. All of the leaves had fallen off, but now it seems to be thriving again. Here it is in a photo taken a month after its ordeal.
And here is its first baby. Not a great photo but the detail shows how the roots grew out from the bottom of the stem at the diagonal cut across the stem, not from a node. I had no idea the Empress Tree (Royal Paulownia) could be propagated so easily. Admittedly, the first time I tried this, the stem cutting wilted and died, but I am not one to give up after just one try if logic tells me something might work.l