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Bury the stem

Chunkypigs

passing the gas
Veteran
you don't bury the root ball deep at the bottom of the pot, you plant it sideways on the surface and the foliage will turn 90 degrees and grow upright. strip the lower branches first.

I thought everyone learned this with tomatoes and applied it to their weed...

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Creeperpark

Well-known member
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Thanks, thats great info and advice, but I just don't mind mistreating my plants, if a plant is some kind of bitchy primadona then I hope it dies, I don't want to have to pamper it. I want rugged workhorse plants that can do most of the work themselves without needing too much assistance. I figure if I neglect and abuse the plants long enough eventually maybe I'll have some really tenacious genetics which can go out into the wilderness and survive on their own, maybe even cause an infestation as severe as something like the Hunter River infestation that was eradicated in the 1960s
That's a good way to look at it when in the wild. Sounds like you are growing sandy loam.
 

Creeperpark

Well-known member
Mentor
Veteran
you don't bury the root ball deep at the bottom of the pot, you plant it sideways on the surface and the foliage will turn 90 degrees and grow upright. strip the lower branches first.

I thought everyone learned this with tomatoes and applied it to their weed...

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Tomatoes have herbaceous stems that will root very easily because of the herbaceous stems. If you do that with a wooden stem plant it would be different and you would get different results than with tomatoes.
 

Creeperpark

Well-known member
Mentor
Veteran
Cannabis has herbaceous stems early during the early seedling stage and can be planted deep. However, when it changes to wood with a root flair after a few weeks of growing it shouldn't be buried too deep.

Why do people not root the "main stem" as a cutting or a clone? Because it won't root very well because woody stems do not root. Planting any woody stem below the flair in the ground will have problems with mold or root rot during the rainy season.

There are a few exceptions to the rule like growing in a light sandy loam with super drainage. From a horticulture, standpoint it's in the woody stem plant's best interest to keep the root flair exposed slightly above the ground.
 

Creeperpark

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Lastly, I will say about 15 years ago I saw a video of Jorge Cervantes talking about burying the stems. So I did it with 20 small plants in the Spring and every plant started failing within 7 days. When I returned to the plot a week later, I dug them up and replanted them at ground level but left 2 for research. The ones I replanted took off and the two I left buried deep in the ground died. Why I remember this so well is because that was all the plants I had raised for planting outdoors that year and saving them was a very big deal.
 

experienced

Active member
Thanks, thats great info and advice, but I just don't mind mistreating my plants, if a plant is some kind of bitchy primadona then I hope it dies, I don't want to have to pamper it. I want rugged workhorse plants that can do most of the work themselves without needing too much assistance. I figure if I neglect and abuse the plants long enough eventually maybe I'll have some really tenacious genetics which can go out into the wilderness and survive on their own, maybe even cause an infestation as severe as something like the Hunter River infestation that was eradicated in the 1960s
guten tag Herr Jager schnitzel!

No doubt you are from Prussian stock.

Stomach Ulcers and intense existential anxiety are yours in the future ...

Your experiments will result in extreme anxiety each time you take a puff. Your throat will scorch and cancers will form there.

But by God! you will have tough plants.

(Hunter River? That's not in Germania! Are you using a vpn?)
 

Brother Nature

Well-known member
Stolons, sometimes also called runners, are slender, elongated horizontal stems that grow above ground. Stolons are classified as either procumbent or repentant. Repent stolons grow roots at nodes on the stem that are in contact with soil, while procumbent stolons do not. Cannabis stems have procumbent stolons. If they were repentant they would continue to grow searching for the soil. Planting any horticulture plant too deep in a container or in the ground is not in the best interest of the plant. You can do it Chuck but it's not in the best interest of the plant.
I respectfully disagree with this. I have seen cannabis plants that root from the stem, even outside of the soil. I currently have 3 different strains at 23 days showing roots above the soil level of the stem. These roots do continue to grow. There's nothing to me that suggests this would be inhibited by them being underground.

Personally, I'll bury seedlings lower than usual if they've 'bolted' but otherwise I tend to repot to the top of the original soil line when I repot. My thinking behind that is more that it gives the established roots more space to grow, can't say if it works any better, just makes sense to me.

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Cerathule

Active member
Cannabis has stolons?!? o_O

You can root Cannabis in any stage of development, even late flower is possible. With "woody" stems, the adventitious roots will just break through it with, but it needs to stay moist outside for some extended period for this top happen.

In high rH environments even "airroots" will sometimes shoot out if the medium is too dry.

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The only thing that doesn't work is an "apical top layering":

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The unidirectionality of the xylem cannot be reversed by Cannabis.
 

Creeperpark

Well-known member
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Veteran
I respectfully disagree with this. I have seen cannabis plants that root from the stem, even outside of the soil. I currently have 3 different strains at 23 days showing roots above the soil level of the stem. These roots do continue to grow. There's nothing to me that suggests this would be inhibited by them being underground.

Personally, I'll bury seedlings lower than usual if they've 'bolted' but otherwise I tend to repot to the top of the original soil line when I repot. My thinking behind that is more that it gives the established roots more space to grow, can't say if it works any better, just makes sense to me.

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Friend, there are four kinds of roots on a single plant. You are showing photos of aerial roots. You can plant them deeply if you don't overwater and the roots can get plenty of air. The roots you are burying are aerial roots that support the plant and anchor it in the ground.

However, I mentor many people that don't have water management skills enough to plant the plants deep without causing problems. Mold and other diseases are common in the growing community. The reason why is not enough air in the root ball. That stem and roots you are holding look pretty unhealthy to me. No disrespect intended.
 
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Creeperpark

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What are aerial roots called?
The roots that grow outside the soil or above the ground are called aerial roots. Prop roots, stilt roots, breathing roots, and climbing roots are four different types of aerial roots.

What are the types of aerial roots?
There are different types of aerial roots. These are stranglers' roots, pneumatophores, haustorial roots, and propagative roots. The roots of strangler plants are those in which the aerial roots eventually strangle the plant of which they grow.
root
adventitious root
strangler
pneumatophore

Here is a photo of the aerial strangler that holds the plant up, but they are not feeder roots.

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VerdantGreen

Genetics Facilitator
Boutique Breeder
Mentor
ICMag Donor
Veteran
whilst i would not worry with some plants such as tomato, it is usually inadvisable to bury the rootball of any woody stemmed plant, and indeed if you look at the instructions that come with most plants from a garden center, it will tell you to be careful to plant it out at the same depth as it is in the pot.
You can do it with seedlings before the stems have hardened but beyond that it isn't a good idea.
Just because you may do it and 'get away with it' doesn't make it good practice !
VG
 

therevverend

Well-known member
Veteran
It depends. What are your conditions like? I've buried plants a few inches up the stalk only to have the stalk rot through below ground level. Timber! Because the soil was rich and the weather was wet and cool. On the other hand I've buried plants in light sandy soil during warm dry weather and they threw roots no problem. It sounds like you want to do it more as an experiment to see what happens then for a real reason.

If I'm going to make something a common practice I like to have a reason for doing it. Plants grow the way they do for a reason. Cannabis naturally has very shallow roots. Burying them 6 inches deep may not accomplish anything besides forcing the plants to use energy to grow more roots again at ground level while the lower root mass is useless. And maybe prone to disease? Or maybe you have windy weather, you don't want your plants getting blown over. Deeper roots may be useful. I like experiments and I like understanding why they grow the way they do. But mostly I like growing big healthy plants.
 

Creeperpark

Well-known member
Mentor
Veteran
What are aerial roots called?
The roots that grow outside the soil or above the ground are called aerial roots. Prop roots, stilt roots, breathing roots, and climbing roots are four different types of aerial roots.

What are the types of aerial roots?
There are different types of aerial roots. These are stranglers' roots, pneumatophores, haustorial roots, and propagative roots. The roots of strangler plants are those in which the aerial roots eventually strangle the plant of which they grow.
root
adventitious root
strangler
pneumatophore

Here is a photo of the aerial strangler that holds the plant up, but they are not feeder roots.

View attachment 18823884
The difference between the aerial and feeder roots is the aerial roots have the same bark around them as the stems and are green. While feeder roots never have bark and are white.
 

Creeperpark

Well-known member
Mentor
Veteran
The root flairs on trees are the same because of the bark on the tree roots is the same bark as the tree. Any root with bark is a flair root or prop root and should not be buried.
 

Chuck Jägerschnitzel

Active member
guten tag Herr Jager schnitzel!

No doubt you are from Prussian stock.

Stomach Ulcers and intense existential anxiety are yours in the future ...

Your experiments will result in extreme anxiety each time you take a puff. Your throat will scorch and cancers will form there.

But by God! you will have tough plants.

(Hunter River? That's not in Germania! Are you using a vpn?)

Thats not a bad guess about my Prussian origins, maybe they're who I learned the stern taskmaster act from. I've admired Von Richthofen family members since before I started growing marijuana, but according to what I've told, my blood is Austrian and Polish to some extent rather than Prussian. Regardless all that, I consider myself to be formerly from Virginia, USA, home of the finest Skunk, currently residing in the Pacific Northwest, where the marijuana plants need to behave just right to bring in a good harvest.
Maybe I'm more sadistic than stern, theres nothing like the thrill of a good cull, I enjoy it every time, knowing that I've righteously rid the world of inferior genetics and secured a brighter future, sometimes I even gleefully taunt or curse at the poor performers as I kill them
Currently connected to the internet via a VPN which seems to be located in Budapest, that was another insightful guess.
 

Redrum92

Well-known member
If you want your stem shorter, keep your light closer from day 1. I see some crazy lanky seedlings on here. I don't believe they should be much taller than the leaves are wide.

It's better to add dirt at the bottom of the pot than the top, as others have explained. Roots always want more room at the bottom, we know that for sure. Why take a chance that the main stem might grow a few roots? Keep perlite on top of the dirt so you don't erode it away, and keep it at the same level throughout the plants life.

As others have said, roots stratify based on water and air levels, and if you bury it deeper, they have to completely rearrange
 
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Brother Nature

Well-known member
Friend, there are four kinds of roots on a single plant. You are showing photos of aerial roots. You can plant them deeply if you don't overwater and the roots can get plenty of air. The roots you are burying are aerial roots that support the plant and anchor it in the ground.

However, I mentor many people that don't have water management skills enough to plant the plants deep without causing problems. Mold and other diseases are common in the growing community. The reason why is not enough air in the root ball. That stem and roots you are holding look pretty unhealthy to me. No disrespect intended.
I am very aware the plants are not healthy, they have had some serious PH issues during my grow, even commented on by you in another thread. Your passive agressiveness really helps though, you seem like a great mentor.

Again, I don't think it's a great idea to bury a stem, but like you say it can be done, just isn't the greatest way to manage height. The OG poster wanted to know if he did it would he rot his stems, I was addressing that with my post and I still disagree with you.

Best of luck with your mentoring, friend.
 
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