Cultivating orchids with rooting hormone

[mbasden]

I would like to know if anyone used rooting hormone to start a new plant. I have taken a cutting from a schomburkia and scored the bottom of it, set it in some rooting hormone and left it in some damp orchid moss. Am I wasting my time and just re-pot keikis?

[digitalgate]

that would not be a good idea. you will only grow roots with no leaves. let it
grow naturally.

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

First, did you get enough of the plant to have a good eye. This is a bump at the base of the pseudobulb. It should be green and not sunken. Without a living eye, there is very little hope, as close to zero as you can get.

Second, rooting hormone in sympodials, like the Schomburgkia, does not act like a rooting hormone when applied to the base, but as an eye stimulant, exactly what you want. As the new roots will come from the new growth (the expanding eye). But there are 2 problems.

First, this is going to take time. If you do not sphag and bag the bulb, it may dessicate too much and not be able to mature the new growth to the point of producing roots. Sphag and bag is the placing of a small amount of mostly wrung out sphag (or what ever you can find that is close, if sphag is not find available in your area) into a ziplock bag with the plant, and leaving it in a medium light, medium temp environment.

Second, you must thoroughly wash the hormone off as soon as you see the eye start to grow. This is extremely important, as the presence of the rooting hormone wine suppress rooting on the new growth. I have seen new growths get out a ways, then start another new growth on the extending eye, without any roots along the way, until the plant had expended all its energy on new growths, then die.

I don't think scoring the bottom is a good idea, but let us know if it results in roots from that area.