Akward Air-Layering Question

Rjoyce

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Hi Nuts, I am fairly new to bonsai and have no experience with air-layering. I have been reading quite a bit about it, but I still have a couple of questions. There are a couple of crab-apple trees at my work which the building manager has mentioned need to have a major trim, so I am hoping to ask him if I can air-layer off some branches first. I want to check and see if these air-layers would even work before asking him and starting a big project that is destined to fail. Here are the main potential problems I see with trying to layer these particular trees:

1) The trees are quite big and the majority of the branches are at least 10 feet off the ground. If I use sphagnum moss and wrap it tight with plastic wrap, and maybe a layer of foil, would it be entirely necessary to water the layers often, since I don't really want to have to get out a ladder and climb to each branch every week or two?

2) Most of the branches, except those in the crown almost 20 feet up, have bent and sagged downward from the weight, so most of the sections I would want to layer would actually be upside-down. I am assuming this would be the biggest problem, but I am hoping someone with experience will tell me it is worth a shot. There are still some smaller branches at the end that are facing upward, but they are rather skinny, straight, and uninteresting.

If anyone has any advice, I would greatly appreciate it. And if the possibility of successfully doing these layers is zero, I could always just try some smaller layers and cuttings. Thanks in advance!

-Ryan
 

BrianBay9

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Yes you can air layer crabapples. In my experience they've been pretty reliable.

In general when I've had a failure air layering it's been due to inaccessibility - either location of the tree or height of the layer. If it's not convenient to check, in my experience I'll eventually wait too long and it will dry out. Maybe you'll be more diligent than me, but it's tough when you have to get out a ladder to water.

I've not tried "upside down" layers, but I don't think that would be a problem. Roots will initially want to go down (up the branch) but they'll sort themselves out after potting.
 

Rjoyce

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Thank you for the response Brian. How long is "too long" between checking the layer. Would I need to check every week? Every two weeks? How long can I let it go between watering?
 

BrianBay9

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Thank you for the response Brian. How long is "too long" between checking the layer. Would I need to check every week? Every two weeks? How long can I let it go between watering?

Sorry, not really possible to say. How tightly wrapped is it? How hot is the weather? How dry? When did it rain last? You can see it's always just a guess. Much better to be able to check the condition of the layer every day.
 

sorce

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Pics!

Welcome to Crazy!

Go for it.

You don't even have to climb the ladder each week....

Just run a black aquarium air tube down the trunk so you can pump water up to it easy.

What kind of work?

Looney bin?
Traffic?

Sorce
 

Saddler

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On my sugar maples last summer I had a ball of moss almost a foot across on some of the airlayers. I only needed to water it once over the summer and we had a brutally dry summer for our area. All the big ones took. Go big and put an extra wrap or two of plastic around it to stop moisture from escaping. when you do water it, use something like a needle and 60cc syringe and then tape the hole shut. I have had every crabapple get roots, but I am zero for four on making it the first summer.

good luck!
 

Rjoyce

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20170516_131012.jpg 20170516_071620.jpg Here are the trees in question. There are two with pink flowers that are a bit shorter and shouldn't be too difficult to get to. The taller one with white flowers will be a bit more difficult, but may be worth a try at least. Maybe I can get away with checking less often if I use a large ball of sphagnum and wrap tight, like Saddler suggested. Thanks for all the advice and will post updates.
 

Saddler

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On all my airlayers, the more vertical the branch, the better the airlayer. I have gotten them to work on weird angles, but the roots are always strongest on the underside of the branch and often no roots on the top side of the branch.

I airlayer on a big branch if possible because so far, the bigger the branch, the better the roots and the better the success surviving the first summer away from mommy. The ball of moss will collect water from the tree weeping and you will have a small pond in the airlayer, I used to drain it. Now I leave it until late July or august and only drain it if it has been a wet cool summer. Some of the trees I have air layered are an hours drive from home so checking more then every six weeks isn't that easy.

One more thing, don't take the plastic off the airlayer until it is in the pot you are going to grow it in. I have killed a few airlayers by being Curious George and wanting to see my work, seconds after I cut it off the tree. Freshly airlayered roots will break like glass. If the plastic gets stuck in the roots, don't pull it out, cut it and leave it. Pretty sure I have killed two air layers by trying to get the plastic from the wrapping out and next thing you know, the moss is coming apart because I broke half the roots off. Glass roots!!!
 
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One mistake I have made in the past is watering too much before the layer starts to produce roots. Just make sure it does not completely dry out before root production, once you have roots you will need to be watching and watering more.
 

Rjoyce

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I was given permission to do some air layers on these trees. After looking more closely, I found a few branches lower down that are a bit more vertical to layer. There are still a couple horizontal branches, but no "upside-down" branches. I have set up four layers so far and will set up a few more next week. I am trying a few different sizes, so we will see which ones work out. Here are pics of the layers I have started so far. 20170526_140311.jpg 20170526_140818.jpg 20170526_140825.jpg 20170526_140346.jpg
 

BrianBay9

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The foil is a very convenient wrap, but in my experience in Wisconsin, the birds just loved to pick it apart. I ended up re-wrapping with plastic wrap. I have no idea what birds wanted with aluminum foil, but the flew off with much of it.
 

Rjoyce

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Thanks for the heads up. There is plastic wrap under the foil to hold the moss in place and the foil there is to keep the layer from getting too hot. I will keep an eye on the foil and replace it if necessary. Birds are weird.
 

Rjoyce

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I set up 4 more branches this week. There are branches of different sizes, and some that are more vertical than others. We will see which ones work! Hopefully with 8 air-layer attempts, I should end up with at least one or two.20170531_153307.jpg 20170531_153323.jpg 20170602_081643.jpg
 

Rjoyce

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Just checked in on the layer. Two definitely have roots growing, while the others are still forming the callous. Hopefully they start putting out roots soon, so they will be ready for removal well before first frost.
 

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Rjoyce

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I removed one of the branches yesterday and potted it up. The roots were already turning tan/brown and had filled the bottom half of the bag, so I went for it. Plus, with 7 more airlayers to remove this year, I wanted to try and spread them out. I didn't remove any of the moss, just popped it in the grow box and added bonsai soil around it, and used guy-wires to hold it still. This will be allowed to recover in semi-shade for the rest of the season and bare-rooted and repoted in early Spring.
 

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JudyB

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That turned out very nicely. Good job picking placement where the movement is nice.
 

Bonsai Nut

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I removed one of the branches yesterday and potted it up.

That's how it's done! Really nice root development!

I would just recommend that you don't wait to long on the rest of them. Fall is just around the corner in Mass. You want to give them some time to get settled in before cold temps.
 

CWTurner

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You might want to think about removing some of the foliage. The parent tree was supporting it, but now that the air-layer roots are all it has, I would reduce it by 1/2 or so.
This is just my opinion, so proceed as you see fit.
CW
 
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