peres - loph grafts forming roots

[kindness]

Hey,

I can't take any pics cause my camera isn't working, however, my loph's grafted to pere's are now forming roots, (they are still grafted) is this a sure sign of time to degraft? If so, do I cut and still leave a bit of the pere's attached? or do I try and get as close to the loph as possible with the cut? Further, can I then just sit the little guys onto some cacti mix or would I make a depression in the soil so they sit a little below the surface line?

They are the caepistosa variety and as such have pups below where the roots are forming.... (gee i wish my camera worked right now!) will this be a problem or will the roots grow around and down past them?

Thanks for the help all

[kindness]

anyone have any experience with this? Just don't want to mess up my first two successful grafts....

[bob-bob]

As long as there are signs of positive growth in your lophs I would leave them grafted.

I am not sure why your grafted lophs would send out roots if the graft was successful perhaps

humidity is high. I have had lophs send out roots from the areola before and it has not caused

any problems.

If you decide to degraft because of the root forming I would cut about 1/2 inch of the pere off with the loph.

This will save a huge problem of trying to heal and root the cut surface.

Hope this helps.

Cheers

[KlUe]

Hey mate, I've had a few unsuccessful grafts of which the lophs have tried to send roots, I guess there is no harm in keeping them on there though..

Peace

[AndyAmine.]

generally it means that the stock and scion have not had a complete union, perhaps the two merristems have not aligned properly?

This doesn't mean that the scion wont grow but it probably wont grow as well as it could and you will also probably get pups from the stock.

If you really want to keep it on the stock and not re-graft then AFAIK it should be ok to go ahead and trim the roots.

I had one that was growing reasonably well but the stock was pupping so it was re grafted and grew much faster.

Naturally, now that they are not allowed in my state I gave it away.

[watertrade]

hey! I had this happen too - just recently - I have a number of plants that were growing great guns and then started to throw roots - I asked the good people of the aussie cacti forum and the final consensus was it was due to environmental triggers ( high humidity )

a part of me thinks it could be due to a salt build in in the soil. could this be a problem you might have too??

[kindness]

Hey,

Thanks for the replies and opinions - the two plants, (or four depending on how you look at it) that are forming roots now started off great guns... booted away and threw heaps of pups... then kind of stopped growing so well, turned a bit red and now are sending out roots as described. I've been checking on their liveliness via the squeeze test and they are still turgid as. I don't think I mentioned that I repotted them about a month ago as the soil they were in previously was shit - this may have something to do with the change?

These guys are growing alongside a couple of other grafts none of which are throwing roots - so perhaps the salt answer is right, (they are in different soil but same growing conditions). I think that I might just take advantage of the roots and welcome the lophs back to life on their own feet. I figure that I will as advised chop the peres close to the loph and put into a good quality cactus mix.

whilst I'm babbling on about grafting I just want to put out a word of encouragement to anyone considering trying this - my first few died in the arse but after reading teo's tek on grafting and trying with a larger number of seedlings things have worked out very nicely. I now have a lovely little family of lophs growing and they are a pleasure to know and listen too.

peace

[kindness]

just been re-reading this post and thought that an update was needed. The lophs in question are still alive and happy and slowly, slowly forming their own roots. I have them sitting on straight up potting mix I got from the nursery... I think they will be fine.

It is a slow road with lophs I reckon but really fun to watch the changes and get to know the individual plants.

peace all

[kindness]

The plants in question did finally grow more roots and are now happily pumping along. see photo attached.

Interestingly I have a bunch of other loph grafts from a range of seeds, all of which are about 8 months old... I have recently returned them to their winter home, (under lights) and the same thing is happening again - roots are forming. The interesting bit, (well to me anyway) is that only the caepistosa (sp?) ones are forming roots - this is again while they are still attached to the peres.

I definately think it has to do with humidity. I am not concerned about it though. I figure this time I will leave them for a while longer and let the roots kinda hang down a bit more before degrafting.

[Chiral]

Degrafted lophs will throw roots into soil much quicker if the top layer of the soil mix is straight wet coir...for some reason it really encourages root growth where as if you simply placed the degrafted loph on top of some cactus mix chances are it won't root for a very long time if at all....I did 20 recently and they all took to the coir and all have roots after a month....they are doing fine now.

H.