Re: Philodendron aerial roots

From: dana at homecom.com (Dana Scholle) on 1997.11.19 at 19:46:41(1637) I grow a lot of orchids, and I know that this is definitely the case with these plants.. If, when repotting, you bury roots that had been growing outside the medium, they tend to suffocate pretty quickly.. +More At 09:33 PM 11/18/97 -0600, you wrote: >>.. Sure, aerial roots >>>have a different epidermal layer than ones that are in potting media but >>>that is only because they are in air and not in media. But, when they find >>>some type of media... they change. >> >>That's my point. My understanding is that subsurface roots are different >>than aerial roots, even if the two zones exist on the same root. Burying the >>aerial portion often leads to rot of the root. If the aerial portion hits >>substrate and changes...I think the root is ok. Does this make any sense? >> >>Carlo > >This makes perfect sense from a biological standpoint. The root tip, just >like the growing tip, has what are termed meristem cells, that is, cells >that are actively dividing but may not have differentiated into specific >cell type (leaf, stem, root hair or whatever), so probably when this >meristem area first contacts some type of substrate suitable for rooting, >the cells behave appropriately (i.e. begin to differentiate). Now if you >bury this area rather than letting the root "feel" the ground first, you >may well short circuit the normal rooting mechanism, leading to the >observed rot. > >Don Martinson >Senior Research Associate >Department of Medicine >Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Clinical Nutrition >Medical College of Wisconsin, FMLH-West >9200 W. Wisconsin Ave. >Milwaukee, WI 53226 >(414) 259-3817 >dmartin@post.its.mcw.edu>

Note: this is a very old post, so no reply function is available.