Thanks so much Pagan. I had a feeling it would be too risky to keep the bottom part. I will do exactly as you have suggested. I too don't remove the leaves as like you said, I think the plant will drop any that it can't support. Really appreciate your advice.

Great advice Pagan! Hope it heals nicely for you Christine.

Tracy

Sounds like it cooked in the sand. I watch mine in the window so it doesn't get to hot. I just had to watch it bloom. Pagan is right on the advice. Now you can have centipede roots to design.

That makes how many plants you have done surgery on. Have to give a progress report.

Her bum has been cut off and sitting in the shade healing. Hopefully in time she will end up looking like one of my others that I cut the tap root off on purpose. I don't use very much sand for my plants for this exact reason. I usually repot any that I am given or buy into my own mix that I know works best for me but I thought this one would have been OK for a while being winter. Best way to learn is the hard way haha.

For now it needs to heal. For 4 or 5 days. After you can either place a disk where you cut and the roots will then grow out like your pic. Mine is young and I layed the roots out as much as I could and on next re-pot next spring. should have some more roots for the centipede effect. It is a process.

This is a beautiful plant, Christine. What a root system, so impressive!

That info. Pagan gave w the plant and it's roots was so spot on. Definitely the way to go.

Keep us posted.

Rick

That's a true stunner Christine! How old is it?

Thanks Conny, My fancy bum one is about 20 months old now. It was a single pink I grew from seed and then grafted the current flowers on it in April this year. I can't remember if it was Tracy or Pagan that gave me the instructions on how to do the root training but I cut the tap roots off 5 plants and they all turned out just as good. Here's another one I trained. This photo was taken just after I grafted it so a bit bare.

You've done a tremendous job!

At what age did you cut the taproots?

I want to share my experience under this post, I think this happens to Christine and could be a useful graphic information for those who have an aggressive sun, it happens to me and I didn't find any help or response at that moment I've thought was fungus, bacteria or anything like that, but no! It was sun burn, literally cooked roots...this is a pic before sunburn:

the tissue is like dry wood:

part of caudex burned too:

this is the an actual picture of that plant:

Carol, your potting soil in the first photo looks aesthetically amazing and fatal.

Pagan

Pagan! I know!!!!! Hahahah was my first victim, in the nursery they did the potting thing for me, I didn't have a clue in that time(2 years ago) they told me to use that soil, here is called "Tierra gorda", and they use it for all cactus and succulent...now, reading a lot, and mostly information in english I did my own potting soil...

I think I have a plant that looks exactly like that lol but I uncooked it by putting it in the shade and giving it some 20-20-20 fertilizer it has a lot of leafs now

Conny, I cut the tap roots off when they were about 4 months old.

Carol, yes, my roots looked like yours except it also had bubbling blisters all over it. There was no sign above the soil to say that there was an issue.

Thanks Christine, I can sit back and relax for a few more months then LOL