I'd like to clone Sally, how many nodes should I have on the cutting, and how deep should I plant it... and how long should I keep the soil really wet (instead of damp) I wouldn't want to over do it and cause rot, or under do it and kill it.

any advice would be great! I'd prefer the direct-to-dirt method instead of soaking in water.

Doesn't work for me. I've had almost 100% success with establishing plants by soaking them first, and pretty much 0% success with direct-to-dirt. YMMV, I guess, but my advice would be to stick 'em in water until they have a substantial root mass.

Oh ok! I will try that then. Thanks

When you're rooting, put them in a window sill that gets some light. That seems to help prevent rot. I do this and have never had an issue. In fact, once I got some unrooted cuttings that were already suffering from rot, which I was able to cut away and root successfully.

Ok thanks, but I thought direct sunlight was a nono?
I've been growing the mother under a CFL, it grows a bit slow but happy.

If it's in a window, it is unlikely to get direct sunlight more than a few hours a day. A few hours should be enough to help with rot.

Salvia (in my experience) does well in dappled sunlight, but it can be acclimated to fairly high light levels. It is not as sensitive as people say, but you have to keep in mind that it is a bit sensitive to transitions. When acclimating plants one should go fairly slowly.

It's been a little over a week since I've put a cutting into a brown beer bottle with water, no sign of roots yet is this normal?

The water was left out over a few nights to distill, i know this doesn't get rid of fluoride but the chlorine should be out by now. The stem is in the water along with one node, a couple other nodes are outside the water. The cut is only a quarter inch or so away from the bottom node.

There are 4 large leaves and two littler newer leaves at the very top, should I remove the larger ones?

any advice would be great Thanks!

Rooting time seems to vary a lot. I've had plants that show signs of rooting in as little as a week, and I've had plants that have taken perhaps six weeks to show those signs.

If the plants aren't wilting--if it looks like they're getting enough water--I wouldn't remove the leaves at this point.

Thanks for all the replies,
today there have started to emerge little roots, they're pretty small. I'd say half the size of a tic tac or so.
so how large should they be before planting in dirt? I will read around for the answer as well

I've not found an answer anywhere online about how long roots should be before planting.

I've gone ahead and planted it into a pot so we'll see how she does once the roots showed up they started to grow rather quickly, even in the same day I could notice a difference in size

this is all great fun

Plant when roots are no less than one inch, the longer roots give the plant a chance to adapt to soil, otherwise they will wilt. Water deeply and give lowish light if plant wilts. Failure occurs when short rooted cuttings, acclimated to water, are put into a drier medium.

all answers here:

http://www.salviasource.org/index.php?page=Cultivation

Thanks Jupe! I found this out today, I saw the soil had a tiny bit of white mold fuzz on it so I took it out of the humidity dome for a while thinking some air would help. The plant leaves got really floppy and wilty so I put it back into the dome, the leaves are perking back up but the poor thing!

I read that a baking soda spray can get rid of mold growth but to me this seems it'd be worse as it is a sodium and basically is like salt isn't it?

I would avoid baking soda, just cut slits in the tent, or ventilate it regularly. If needed, trim large leaves of cutting off, it will help the plant, to not have to rehydrate those leaves daily. Many people do cuttings with only one or two smaller leaves at the top of cutting. I usually strip 78% of leaves off. They never wilt, and adapt to ambient conditions quicker.

Plants can adopt to a very wide range of humidities, but only after they are well established. Here it goes from 20% to 99% in a few hours, (and vice versa) and plants do fine. Mine are rooted outside, in varying conditions, so they are used to it though. Indoor plants can get too "used" to unvarying conditions, and when things change, they suffer.

I would never, ever use a tent. In fact, I never had, and many of the difficulties I've heard people tell of have been related to the use of tents.

Let the roots get long enough (maybe two inches), and make sure there are no over-large leaves, and the plant will be able to absorb everything it needs through the roots. If you see wilting it means the plant is giving off more water than it can absorb.

Jupe is right: Salvia is very sensitive to transitions. That's one of the reasons tents aren't good, for there are two transitions involved (when you put it on and when you remove it).