Up-Side-Down Air Layering possible?

What would happen if you air layer a plant.. Then instead of cutting below the roots like normal. Cut above the roots and use the lower portion instead?
would it work?
Would the Xylem and Phloem swap functions?
Would the xylem simply switch diections and pump downwards?
Would the rooting proccess disconnect the lower portion making it not work?

plant hormone: auxins will interfere with your grand plans
as it not only controls sunlight on your plant
but also 'control's the gravity aspect of root and stem growth

good luck and worth a try all the same ..lol

Not trying to disprove vostok but I think it would just keep growing and functioning as an extra rootball and eventually get rootbound and need to be potted up lol.. It would probably just feed the nodes closest to it and the old roots will continue feeding the rest. You could test this theory by growing it like that for a while then cutting the aerial rootball off at the start or in the middle of lights on. Unless she can redirect some energy back to those nodes instantly, the highest nodes would wilt, and my theory could be assumed as correct? Very open to be correction of any sort. I don't mean to sound like a know it all but sometimes I think that's how it comes across.

Just my 5c, could be miles off, you guys probably know a shitload more than me (actually you definitely do) but I do think plants and nature in general kind of takes the route of least resistance and the scenario I described is how I think that would look. I was just thinking along the lines of how trees sometimes ground-layer themselves, wouldn't it kind of be like that?

vostok said:

plant hormone: auxins will interfere with your grand plans
as it not only controls sunlight on your plant
but also 'control's the gravity aspect of root and stem growth

good luck and worth a try all the same ..lol

Click to expand...

The roots would be at the bottom once rooted, cut, flipped upsidedown and transplanted. I'm just not sure if they can supply nutrients in the opposite direction and how it would work. It seems like an interesting expermiment i would like to try but i have no experience with air layering.

If you plan on flipping it like I think you are.....I bet your branches would just roll and grow. Air layering is something I want to try.

you wouldn't have any leaves to support photosynthesis....it might live long enough to put out a few shoots, might not...

Roger A. Shrubber said:

you wouldn't have any leaves to support photosynthesis....it might live long enough to put out a few shoots, might not...

Click to expand...

There would be leaves. they would just be up-side-down for a little bit before self correcting.

The air layer would be in the middle of a branch with enough leaves underneath to support growth once inverted and transplanted.

What's your goal? Just to say you can or is there somewhere your going with this?

ubluntu said:

There would be leaves. they would just be up-side-down for a little bit before self correcting.

The air layer would be in the middle of a branch with enough leaves underneath to support growth once inverted and transplanted.

Click to expand...

if the base of the stem is going to be the new crown...you're going to have a very strange looking plant, with no apical dominance till a branch or new shoot takes over, if one ever does...i don't see the purpose of it, unless it's to satisfy your own curiosity. it will probably work, but i have my doubts about how that clone will develop

I'm just curios if it is possible and how nutrient/sugar transport would work if it did. Also wonder if it would grow really weird or interesting if somehow the xylem and phloem reveresed directions.

ubluntu said:

I'm just curios if it is possible and how nutrient/sugar transport would work if it did. Also wonder if it would grow really weird or interesting if somehow the xylem and phloem reveresed directions.

Click to expand...

Ohhh okay... I thought you meant doing an air-layer on the main stalk and cutting off the part above it once it roots and just leave a friggin' root ball hanging out in mid-air so your plant's powered from both ends like a bloody double-ended HPS!

lol now I think I know what you're on about... So let me get this straight...


Say for instance, you had a plant that was 10 nodes tall, you remove the 6th node and put the air layer medium there, let it grow some roots...
When it's rooted, you cut off everything above the 6th node and throw that part away (or clone it like a normal person would)...
Then you cut the air layer off just below the 4th node of the original plant, leaving 3 nodes behind...
This would leave you with your new mother plant, and your air-layer with 2 nodes, which you then turn over and chuck into another pot of media, or the ground.

Sounds like a MAJOR waste of time to me...












...I accept your challenge!...


A runt from the last litter of some random homemade probably hermie something or other...



...some tap water with a splash of silicate, a dash of kelp powder, a squirt of calmag, a drop of pH down...







...thought I got a snap of the 0.4 EC light on but I only had ones of the half-lit and fully lit 0.6 EC light, it was somewhere around 0.5 EC. Couldn't accurately measure pH because I only use drops so I just made it low 6's before adding the kelp...







...had to remove another node below the jiffy so I could fit the cover over it...





...then I had to prop her up because things got a bit rough while trying to wrap the wire around the crumbling jiffy pot while the plant was still standing, before I had the bright idea of laying it on it's side. A rockwool cube would have made this process a lot easier...





Got'er done just as the lights were going out.. I knew there was a reason to keep this plant around lol...

Cheers Mitchician That looks like a great specmine for the experiment! I can't wait to see what happends!

I like the idea you mentioned of laying it on it's side. Made me think of strawberry stolons.. I wonder if nutrient transport is one way with runner plants? hmm..

Yeah it seems the photo I had of her lying down before the cover went on didn't load, I'll try again...


The node beneath the jiffy had to be removed so the cover could fit...




It still looks pretty much the same now, I'll upload pics when I first take the cover off, probably next weekend. Gotta sort out some better lighting for it now, only been getting weak CFL light since birth, gonna have to get out the old school 250w MH lol..

Any updates?

Uh oh... I was hoping this would get forgotten about for a while longer..

She's still going, but the air-layer STILL hasn't rooted and to be honest I was kind of neglecting her for a while because things weren't going the way I wanted them to I guess.. She also became part of a new trial of a technique I learned from Richard Drysift which is a version of monstercropping where you put the plant in bloom until you see pistils then you reveg them before they get into full bloom, and then bloom them again soon after, or something along those lines.. Makes massive beautiful buds go check it out.. His plants are amazing, complete opposite of mine.
Problem was I fucked it all up by leaving her in too small a pot which I think delayed bloom (or it's just this strain because her sister plant also took forever to throw pistils), so I ended up leaving her in bloom for about 3 weeks.. When I took her back out I couldn't use the space I was going to use to veg her properly so she's just been taking a spot in the bloom closet at night and in the window during the day to get the 18 hours, so that surely delayed things as well.
I finally repotted her into about a gallon of straight, fresh coco about a week ago, which she filled with roots in just 3 days, and I thought that would encourage her to root out the air-layer but I checked yesterday and still nothing..
Don't lose faith in me yet though I have big plans for this girl and it's gonna have a 3rd experiment started on it when this farrrking thing finally roots so stay tuned if you have the patience and the faith lol.. I'll start giving her some attention now I know someone cares. Here's a now pic..



I know the ones on the right look a bit naked I just stripped them last night, they're part of another trial, they got repotted 2 weeks into bloom..
They're all under a 250 hps (for now) in a 1200x500mm closet (also only using 1100mm height from false floor to bar the light hangs from).
When I repotted AL (AirLayer) I tried another 'experiment'.. left about 1" of the rootball out of the new media, and was planning on washing the old coco away over the next few weeks as I water to reveal the old roots, but that didn't go too well either because she was much more rootbound than I expected..



As you can see, I don't like to be bound by the "do's and don'ts" of growing, I just like to try shit. I think we need to test the rules sometimes.
Until next time..

Mitchigan you should hit up my buddy @ToneOZ hes been working on all sorts of unorthodox methods.

Thanks mate I'll check him out some time..

Quick update.. Last night after I posted in here I sprayed the jiffy with some 6.5 pH water, then as it was dripping off I decided to catch a few drops and test the pH.. was around 7. That's probably got something to do with why there's no roots yet. The stalk is also very woody though, not the nice soft stem you're meant to clone with.

Then I thought of dripping a drop or 2 of clonex gel into my spray bottle, checked the pH, and it had risen back to 7, so that makes me think maybe I put too much clonex on the stalk and it soaked into the jiffy and raised the pH to an unsuitable level. I pH'd the water back down to 6.3ish and sprayed the heck out of the puck until the runoff was the same as was going in.. Then I gave her a massive haircut.
She was also one of the 2 weakest rooting plants out of a batch of homemade random mixed up seed so it probably wasn't a great idea to try a cloning experiment with such a weak plant. There's also a high chance she's gonna hermie if she does finally make it to bloom proper.
Don't really care about that though this isn't about getting buds it's about getting knowledge.
I do think I should try this again with a more suitable plant and when my real life isn't such a mess lol

Mitchician said:

Ohhh okay... I thought you meant doing an air-layer on the main stalk and cutting off the part above it once it roots and just leave a friggin' root ball hanging out in mid-air so your plant's powered from both ends like a bloody double-ended HPS!

lol now I think I know what you're on about... So let me get this straight...


Say for instance, you had a plant that was 10 nodes tall, you remove the 6th node and put the air layer medium there, let it grow some roots...
When it's rooted, you cut off everything above the 6th node and throw that part away (or clone it like a normal person would)...
Then you cut the air layer off just below the 4th node of the original plant, leaving 3 nodes behind...
This would leave you with your new mother plant, and your air-layer with 2 nodes, which you then turn over and chuck into another pot of media, or the ground.

Sounds like a MAJOR waste of time to me...












...I accept your challenge!...


A runt from the last litter of some random homemade probably hermie something or other...
View attachment 4420875


...some tap water with a splash of silicate, a dash of kelp powder, a squirt of calmag, a drop of pH down...


View attachment 4420880

View attachment 4420881


...thought I got a snap of the 0.4 EC light on but I only had ones of the half-lit and fully lit 0.6 EC light, it was somewhere around 0.5 EC. Couldn't accurately measure pH because I only use drops so I just made it low 6's before adding the kelp...


View attachment 4420893
View attachment 4420895
View attachment 4420897View attachment 4420898


...had to remove another node below the jiffy so I could fit the cover over it...


View attachment 4420899


...then I had to prop her up because things got a bit rough while trying to wrap the wire around the crumbling jiffy pot while the plant was still standing, before I had the bright idea of laying it on it's side. A rockwool cube would have made this process a lot easier...


View attachment 4420915


Got'er done just as the lights were going out.. I knew there was a reason to keep this plant around lol...

Click to expand...

How is this one doing

Last night I took the 250 hps back out as the weather's starting to get really warm down here and the heat was causing my bedroom to stay around 26C (80F) all night, with about 31C inside the closet (lights on 9pm-8am). This would have been nice for the plants with the added co2 from my lungs, but it was making my already terrible sleeping habits even worse. I expected to have to do this soon, just wanted to leave it in there as long as possible.
The LED is so much better to the eye though and knowing the efficiency is probably double or more of the hps helps me sleep better too.
The plants ended up getting a bit of a rest day 'cos when I plugged in the light, the watt meter said 90w so I went to find the screwdriver to turn it up.. Just remembered I was doing that now
Tonight I'll give them 150w to make up for it (still only about 28w/sq. ft., only using approx. 500x1000mm. Fan takes up 200 of the 1200 length)

Under hps just after the strip...


Last night after putting LED back in closet...


Just now...


Still no roots yet, wasn't expecting any, just thought you may have wanted to see. There weren't even little nubs when I opened the puck the other day. On the plus side there's no anaerobic smell, or any smell coming from it at all (except for a light dankness from the few trich's).
I shouldn't have procrastinated so long with remedying the conditions though. She still spends the day in the window.

Sorry, I know the meaning of succinct but unfortunately I have no idea how to implement it.
If anyone wants me to stop posting full pics because of slow load times or whatever, let me know and I'll use thumbnails. Cheers

I would mention something about an alternative air layering reversal technique but since its going in a book i wony