Interesting Just wet Sphagnum Moss and Saran wrap. Score the cambium apply moss and Saran wrap for about 3 months.

I saw this method done for Olive air layers, and it seems so much easier!!  He painted something on the cutting.  Rooting hormone?  Not sure what, but I think that's what it was.  No comprende!!

Suzi

I like it !! Thanks so much Grasa !!

Muito obrigado

OK!  Translate, already!  What did he paint on the wound?

Suzi

I believe he said someting along the lines of a Hormone and fungacide solution, but looking at the bottle maybe just fungacide

So a dilution of Physan 20?  Or maybe a rooting hormone!  Which?

Suzi

IBA liquid rooting solution,

http://www.hortus.com/

many nurseries will also add fungacide to this to make the success rate higher

Rooting hormone (Vegetable hormone) or butyric  (iba) acid concentration of 1500 *something* I cannot get it.  lol, southern accent! 

Looking at my "Woody plant Propagation handbook"  air layering recomendation was 1000ppm IBA solution spray, following by lanolin paste. The benefit of the pills or powder form of IBA is a water based solution can be made at various strengths depending on the application. I have found however for figs, a simple dusting of the air layer wound with Homodin 1 which is far cheaper and common to find.

My mother's family was from St Miquel so the accent sounds like coastal to me

I am from the central west of Brazil, they are from the south. ( like Washington and Alabama) perhaps he said ppm, I never heard of the term, and with his accent, I  could not figure it out... you are right, Jack, there must be the unit of concentration.  they talked about a 1500- you read 1000, so there must be a medium there.  They report that they have 90% sucess rate, and did not have that when hormone was not used.  

typically when i do air layer, i just got plastic wrap, put handful of soil mix on it, and wrap around the area that i'm going to cut. so far i only have done.. 5 or so. all did great. no hormone needed.

Pete!!!! that is an amazing root ball. How long did it take and what kind of weather... that is a WOW picture, contest winning!   I guess, I am too impatient, when I see the roots showing, I cut and put in pots... but I was doing some large /fat (2-3") in diameter, I did not want any accident with them.  And you just plant the ball, not try to untangle, correct?

i did that this spring on my Kathleen's Black for a trade. the temp was around 80-90. took a month. by the time it was cut off, the temp started going into above 100. no, i didn't untangle the roots. but if i was to keep the air layer, i'll be untagling it when i'll bare root it to put into my soil mix next spring. i'll be doing bare root on most of my 1 gal pots coming spring to put them into 5-10 gal container.

I tried the straight sphagnum moss trying to airlayer the top off of a beat up tree. I have had much better luck with potting soil

What I like about the moss is it sticks together, making wrapping with plastic wrap easy!  Perlite and peat fall apart, and you really need a plastic bottle to keep the soil together. 

All said, it's a rooting method, and you will eventually cut the rooted branch and transplant it into something larger.

Suzi

long strand, fresh moss sticks together fairly well with the dampness, the most common issue is not a tight seal allowing the water to evaporate. Soft eletrical tape that sticks to itself common for automotive use vs home electrical work works best for the plastic ends that terminate on the stem ends