Hi Elizabeth,
Rootone or any other rooting hormone is a no no for propagating AVs. It forces the leaves to produce a good root network but little else. Hopefully the leaves you repotted in new soil will produce some plantlets just by the fact that you have agitated the root system. If the leaves are still green they still be viable enough to produce babies. Keep your fingers crossed and don't give up on them.
Fred in NJ

Fred,
Oh... I tried to propagate using nothing but they rotted. Maybe I overwatered them? I guess it wasn't an entire waste of money to buy the rooting hormone since some of my jades and kalanchoes cuttings seem to have propagated with it. I wish I would have known that though, I would have tried something else. What do you mean by agitated the root system? I mean I realize that sounds pretty straight forward, but how are the chances of new plants forming increased by repotting the leaves? When should I give up if I don't see anything... also, why does it say that you can use rooting hormone for avs if all it does is create roots and nothing else... man that stinks lol.

Elizabeth

Fred,
I decided to cut off the rooted tips of the two leaves that I put rooting hormone on 3-4 months ago, cut the first tip of the one off, put it in new av soil, was going to cut the second tip off (man, you should have seen the roots on this thing), noticed something weird looking and wa la! I noticed this branch coming from the root ball with what looked like a a whitish colored v... is this a new plant? I placed it in the pot with the other leaf, burying that v thing underneath the soil like it was buried before I messed with it. I placed a plastic bag on the pot, it is a plastic pot by the way, and put it back where I've had it for the last week or so.

I plan to stick the pot in a sunnier windowsill tomorrow, it receives about a half an hour to an hour of direct sun (well, it comes through a west window) for the next couple of weeks in the hopes that the extra humidity in the bag will help both leaves and that v thingy grow. I am going to cut the tips of the other leaves tomorrow and do what I did with these two... maybe I will find another v thingy as I call it... could always hope, looks like you were right about agitating the root system. :)

Elizabeth

IM sure Fred knows his stuff but I have to disagree with him on this one. Im getting babies every 6weeks or so and I use the rooting hormone every time, but I keep the soil good and moist and it has to get light or the mother leaf will die or rot. But I do use artificial light.

Hi,
I know that a leaf will eventually produce plantlets using rooting hormone but a lot depends on the size of the cup used, the freshness of the leaf, and the composition of the mix they are put in. If a leaf using rootone is put into a large pot, the leaf will first have to grow the roots out to the pot before it sends anything up. At least that is what I have been taught. That's why when I want to make plants from one of my plants I try taking the leaf from the third row of the plant and not a leaf from the outer edge.
Fred in NJ

Hi,
Would anyone mind telling me if that weird v thing is indeed a new plant forming? I will wait and see what happens with the other leaves, I cut a couple of the tips off of some leaves and left the roots on others (roots formed from rooting hormone)... my biggest question is just if that v thingy is a plant, I hope so!

Elizabeth

yes the v thing was plant or baby starting to form . You may have interrupted things by repotting at that time. For what its worth , if your mother leaf is healthy maky sure the stem buried is only 1/2-3/4 inch long no more , mist it well , bag it for two weeks , remove the bag then keep it moist for the remaining time and you should see babies in 6-8weeks. Good luck whatever you decide to do.

hummersteve,
Oh ok... well, that is good news, I have been waiting 3-4 months already lol. I hope I did not disturb it too much. I did mist it, placed it in a bag, and plan to stick it in a brighter window in a couple of days. I will let you guys know once I see something occur... I hope it works.

Elizabeth

WOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I looked at my baby today and it has one little itty bitty leaf that has just emerged out of the soil. I have been waiting what feels like years for something to happen. I said I would let you guys know when something happened and well here is my notice.... I'll have a photo once it gets big enough to take a picture.

Elizabeth

Elizabeth

Congratulations!! You are a new mother. I would say the average time for them to appear would be 6-8wks. I think the first time for me was over 2mo but they came up behing the mother so I didnt see them right away. This is all a learning process and Im constantly learning more. Some of this learning is by failure and thats how we learn.

hummersteve,
I made a new thread just in case nobody got to reading this one, but now I see someone did, thanks for replying. :) I am excited as this av was one I got at Wal-Mart (very small av, about 2 1/2-3 inches in circumference) in bad shape and one day noticed white bugs crawling all over it.

Instead of killing it, I thought I'd take all the leaves off, make sure I didn't see any white bugs on them, and try to make new plants from it. After killing about 7-8 leaves (I guess they rotted, turned to mush), I ended up with 3... later bent one by accident and ended up throwing it away, now have two, one of which is the new baby. I will post a photo once it blooms as I found the flowers to be, while simple, unique and beautiful.

Elizabeth

I realize this is an old thread but wanted to give my 2 cents. When I started to grow my AV NOIDs last year I started 2 dome containers. One I used root start with half of the leaves cut at the top and the other half I used full leaves. The other dome lid I didn't use rooting hormone with the same half cut the top of the leaves and half uncut. Each box grew and the half leaves grew faster. They didn't live to produce other babies after the harvest but the whole leaves did. My unscientific experiment results are that hormone didn't help but half leaves did if you want faster results but risk only one set of babies. :) Just one experiment maybe I will do another and take pics to document. I need to get some leaves to do it. Oh and one other strange thing I noticed...the ruffly (girl) leaves survived better! Strange huh!