My trees have been doing so well until this past week :(  I have a beautiful VDB cutting from a member that has been throwing out roots that have been gorgeous!!  Until this past week.  I watered it, I didn't think it was too much, but obviously my thinking isn't working properly

ARRGH!!! 

It has been wilting a bit, checked the cup and it is wet - couldn't believe it.  I put the cover on the bin and it perked up a bit, the soil is quite wet, tried to wick it out with a paper towel.  I left the cover off today and it is more wilted then before.

ARRGH!!

Do you think I should take it out of the cup and try to save it by planting in fresh medium??  I love this cutting, I hate to lose it :(

JoAnn, they seem to recover, do not do anything with them, leave it uncovered.  What I do, is semi tie a plastic bag on the cutting itself, leaving the soil to air out.  Also, you may wish to gently scoop the top soil away from the cutting to allow it to dry a bit near the cutting.   By putting the bag on the cutting, you can turn a fan nearby for a day or 2 and back to normal.

Good luck there, I totally know the feeling.

1. Remove bulb from turkey baster. ; D

2. Insert pointed end into hole in bottom of cup, or cover hole with wide end; whichever gives a better seal.

3. Blow steadily for a few minutes daily to exchange the air in the mix and create open gas pathways.

It can't hurt but does not always help either.

If you can be gentle enough with, I would use this approach: Turn the cup sideways and gently begin to loosen the medium by rolling the cup back and forth in your hand while tipping slightly and letting the cutting and medium slowly slide out. Once out, gently remove and soaked medium still attached to the cutting, if any. In the new cup, put about an inch of medium on the bottom, set and hold the cutting in the cup and very gently put medium back into cup a little at a time so you don't break any roots. Once the medium at the bottom of the cup gets saturated with water, you're just asking for problems by leaving it in that mush.

put your hand on the top of the cup, holding in the soil. turn the whole thing upside down and let the water drip out. if there is too much water in the soil, it will come out that way. also, on the bottom of the cup, if you have holes, stick few match stick or someting in there and move it around. this will move the soils blocking the air way on the bottom.

another thing is, do not let the cup sit on the flat surface. make sure there is some room between the bottom of the cup and bottom of humidity bin you are using so there will be air going in to the cup from the bottom and the water will flow out. i use light defuser (?) grill to rest my cups so the water will flow out when it's in the humidity bin.

let me know if the cuttng dies. i'll think of a back up plan :)

I had about 20 cups that I had put outside for the beautiful spring-like weather, with all this rain the cups became waterlogged even though I had plenty of drainage holes in bottom and sides.  I am not satisfied with this current pile of potting mix, I think it holds too much water, as evidenced by my cups.  I have just finished changing out all the mix in all the cups.  My thinking was that if I left them alone, they may die, if I mess with them, they may die so I took the chance on changing out the mix.  I don't know if it will work, but they had all the symptoms of drowning so what the heck.

You can also drill holes in the sides of the cup to get better air exchange.  Bottom line is that your soil holds too much water.  I would get it out of there, rinse all the soil off and repot in something that drains better. 

at cup stage, the soil mix should be such that it will hold water for about a week or two in the humidity bin. what works best for me so far has been MG seedling soil and MG perlite at 1:1. with humidity cover on during the initial period, the water will not evaporate too soon. however, after 3-4 week, and the cover removed for good part of the day and god amount of leaves and roots, i do need to water them every week or so.

I added pumice rocks (black gold) to my last batch and that seems to help drain better. the pebbles are a bit larger.  I also learned to use a seringe to give them water, that way the top soil is totally dry and not good for gnats.  I scort the water inside the soil, not on top. and I can control how much to give them.

JoAnn,

What were you using for potting mix and the ratio?  When transplanting from the starting 32 oz deli containers to 1-gallon nursery pots, I stayed with a 60/40 ratio of perlite/potting mix except I moved up a size in perlite (went from Miracle Grow perlite to Greenhouse Megastore coarse perlite).  This coarse perlite was only slightly larger than the MG perlite.  Although I think the coarser perlite provided just enough drainage and was the only thing that got my cuttings in 1-gallon pots through the rainy days we have been having here lately in Houston.

Well, things got busy for me the last few weeks and I have to admit I have been a bit negligent with the figs.  The roots on that cutting were brown and definitely looked like they were rotted.  I was very disappointed but left it alone.  I covered the bin and just kept an eye on it and peeked at the cups every day or two.

Last night I saw new white roots!!  Yeah!!!  It didn't die!!

My soil mix is 50/50 seed mix and perlite by volume.

I was wondering where you were, Jo-Ann!  Glad to hear about the new roots!  I have a Dottato that is doing the same thing.  All dark puny roots, but recently, new thick white roots are coming in.

Congratulations! hope you get lots of figs from them.

I was busy with work, getting ready for the new puppy, last Thursday Glenn got pneumonia and went to the hospital - of course he wouldn't stay - double ARRRGH!!!,  the new puppy came home last Friday and started puppy training classes - Whew!!! 

I have just been able to keep an eye on trees and rooting cuttings to make sure they aren't drying out too much.