Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Whyyyyy won't it root! Some one help me out!!!

It won't?? That's perhaps a first. Remove the lower two leaves of a cutting and then make sure the leaf nodes are under the substrate. The roots will originate at the leaf nodes. Or just stick it in a jar of water.

I use pothos only for nursery tanks and just lay it on its side on top of the coconut fiber, not worrying about whether it roots or not, and it eventually does.

There are actually two different plants called pothos. The true Pothos, while closely related (P. jambea, scandens, hermaphroditus, zippelii, are the ones I'm familiar with) are rather different from what most hobbyists call pothos, and can be somewhat difficult to grow as a house plant, so aren't usually readily available. These have narrower leaves that come off of an elongated leaf node, so it looks like a leaf sprouting from a leaf. What most people call "Pothos" is a Scindapsus, most often the old hybrid known as "Marble Queen," or S. aureus--the "Golden Pothos, or a tricolored variety, which are all variegated. They're all from the same rather large family as Philodendrons,(Aracea.)
-----
Patty
Pahsimeroi, Idaho

D. auratus blue
D. galactonotus pumpkin orange splash back
D. imitator
D. leucomelas
D. pumilio Bastimentos
D. fantasticus
P. terribilis mint and organe
D. reticulatus
D. castaneoticus
D. azureus
P vittatus
P. lugubris

I'm sure I have the later of the two 'pothos', as it is from Home Depot. I've tried sticking the leaves in water, and after a week or so they just turn brown and none have rooted. I have a few others in potting soil in different types of sunlight, and none of those have rooted, either. The cuts were clean when I took them, so I don't really know what's up. I'll try taking a long leaf with other leaves on it and try placing those in the water. Do you just cut the older leaves off?

Anywho, thanks Slay. My thumb is perpetually black, plants seem to hate me.

Andrew,

Just make sure you have some of the "stalk" cut off as well, not just the little part that goes directly to the leaf. You should have no problem then.

That's you problem, Andrew. You root the stems, not the leaves of these plants. I just wasn't getting how you were doing this, so didn't make it clear. When you remove the lower leaves of a cutting, it is the node on the stem where the leaf was that will grow the roots. You just throw the leaves you remove away.

It CAN be a bit confusing, since some plants will root from leaf cuttings, such as African violets, and some begonias will even grow new plants when you lay the leaf on the soil and cut the veins here and there.

Don't worry, your "Black Thumb" will turn green with some practice. I have a black friend who is a hopeless gardener. He informed me his thumb is turning green however-- gangrene.
-----
Patty
Pahsimeroi, Idaho

D. auratus blue
D. galactonotus pumpkin orange splash back
D. imitator
D. leucomelas
D. pumilio Bastimentos
D. fantasticus
P. terribilis mint and organe
D. reticulatus
D. castaneoticus
D. azureus
P vittatus
P. lugubris

Sorry, I was at Uni, and then had to go straight to work.

This is what i've done..I've cut the pothos stem about half way down, and stuffed that in some water.

Are you saying to cut it out with it's roots? Like, into the root bulb and then put them in water?

Andrew, I'm going to have to make a trip to S. California to beat you up before this discussion is over, or send out my friend with the gangrenous thumb to do it for me. Is there an Amtrak into your area? I refuse to fly anymore. I hate to be cavity searched, stripped naked, then stacked like cord wood in seats too small for even me, (and I weigh only 100 pounds,) without food sustenance in order to fly, especially when my luggage gets routed to China, and the really fat guy next to me weighs about 400 pounds, raises the arm rest and oozes over into my space and I get squashed like a fruit fly in lime jello. So don't expect me to arrive by plane to slap you silly. Meet the Amtrak train. I'll be the old lady with the private compartment.

O.K. Lets start over. If you have anything left of that first poor Pothos plant you have been molesting, examine it carefully. Is there a stem left with a growing tip and a few leaves below it? If so, just cut the stem off, strip off the lower leaf and stuff the stem in the soil, or water, with the part of the stem the leaf as been stripped off from, below the soil, and the other leaves above it. If there is nothing much left, after the experiments, do not despair. A Scindapsus is next to impossible to. kill. You will get first prize if you can manage it. When you finally get down to the roots of the original plant, just throw what's left of them into your terrarium, willy nilly, and they will put out more leaves. After that you will discover that putting pothos into a terrarium wasn't a very good idea in the first place, because it's generally big and ugly and grows too huge for the space you have. My own pothos house plant grows in a 10 inch pot on the upper story over a balcony, straggles down a spiral stair well with multiple tentacles, into the kitchen, and I suspect it of attempting to strangle my cats. I do use cuttings of it for my nursery tanks for new frogs, just chopping off a length of stem of it and throwing it in, where it over-survives. But I never use it in my permanent frog tanks. There are better and more delicate plants for that.
-----
Patty
Pahsimeroi, Idaho

D. auratus blue
D. galactonotus pumpkin orange splash back
D. imitator
D. leucomelas
D. pumilio Bastimentos
D. fantasticus
P. terribilis mint and organe
D. reticulatus
D. castaneoticus
D. azureus
P vittatus
P. lugubris

Patty, you're officially my favorite. I'm not putting the pothos in my tank, i'm just trying to get it to grow. If I can do this, I can do anything!

But really, I think I may just take a horticulture class. Or keep bugging you, whichever one is faster.

I may just have to order my plants online. Woe is me.

Andrew, instead of babbling away like the smart-ass I get to be in the middle of the night, I should have just posted a picture or two. Here you can (hopefully) see where the roots originate--or these nodules can also become leaves, depending upon the conditions. Looking at your own pictures again, you probably did just fine and those might root. I just couldn't discern any stem there. Even looking along the stems of the pothos, you might be able to see some little bumps or humps--These are also potential roots if they contact wet soil or water.

I couldn't get a third picture to upload showing the developing roots, but I'll go back and try again.

-----
Patty
Pahsimeroi, Idaho

D. auratus blue
D. galactonotus pumpkin orange splash back
D. imitator
D. leucomelas
D. pumilio Bastimentos
D. fantasticus
P. terribilis mint and organe
D. reticulatus
D. castaneoticus
D. azureus
P vittatus
P. lugubris

I finally got it uploaded. Here's just a piece of pothos I threw in a quarantine tank sideways without bothering to root it first.

-----
Patty
Pahsimeroi, Idaho

D. auratus blue
D. galactonotus pumpkin orange splash back
D. imitator
D. leucomelas
D. pumilio Bastimentos
D. fantasticus
P. terribilis mint and organe
D. reticulatus
D. castaneoticus
D. azureus
P vittatus
P. lugubris

If I weren't retarded, I would have understood all this the first 5 times you told me. The plant I took my cuttings from were rather small, and just had single leaves upon single stalks. Maybe that's why I can't get anything to root. I'll stealing a cutting from Home Depot, and trying it that way. Sorry for my inability to think.

I wish I could be around to witness the "Great Southern California Pothos Heist."
-----
Patty
Pahsimeroi, Idaho

D. auratus blue
D. galactonotus pumpkin orange splash back
D. imitator
D. leucomelas
D. pumilio Bastimentos
D. fantasticus
P. terribilis mint and organe
D. reticulatus
D. castaneoticus
D. azureus
P vittatus
P. lugubris