Cordyline Surgery - to cut in half?

[cordyman]

Hey guys,

first post so be gentle!

I had to move my Cordyline 8 weeks ago and at 4 years old and 7 foot was a mammoth task!

Since the move the trunk has started to lean a lot half way upwards and the head of the plant is no longer completly vertical and true as it used to be but flopped over and looking a little worse for wear. I've watered Cordy loads and used fertiliser.

I'm now considering sawing the top half off as I read this will start a new head or even multiple heads. Have I read correctly here? Any technique to it or just a standard wood saw?

ps. after the move I removed some of the bottom leaves with scissors (conflicting advise here some say tear off / some say don't this damages the trunk) - my other option would be to remove all the other leaves and leave the top tuft?

heres some pics >>>

[eyefi]

they hate being moved. did you get the entire tap root?

[cordyman]

Yes entire tap root came out in full, with smaller roots the rootball was around a meter wide.

[bodster]

cutting the top off might actually help it establish. It will reduce the water loss from the plant as it new roots. Cordys are pretty good at reshooting. You may find though that the new shoots come from the base rather than the top

[eyefi]

i love those multi trunked from the base cordys. i have one in the front that i'm going to do this to. i have no experience of this personally but one locally had the top killed in a frost years ago and the trunk was removed at ground level. the plant now has 5 trunks growing from the base and looks awesome. it is supposed to do this if you just cut the trunk off even if it's not dead. there is some chance of failure though. i don't know when would be the best time to do this, probably spring.

one of my cordys in the back has sprouted again from the base this summer even though the top is fine and growing well.

i wonder if yours would get multi trunked with it having damaged roots?

[Adrian]

I think you will just have to take your chances, the move has obviously set it back so you might get it to shoot from the trunk, maybe from the base but you might lose it all together so be prepared for either.
Large Cordylines arent easy to move.

As for removing the leaves, of course its a personal choice but I think cut leaf bases looks absolutely horrible and can be a nice trap for rot or infection, by a million miles the best way is to pull the leaves off leaving the nice clean trunk.
If someone told you that you would damage the trunk by pulling dead leaves off then they were wrong.

[cordyman]

Thanks for continued input.

My plan is once the cut leaves completely brown off I will gently remove the remained of the leaf.

It seems to have straighened up slightly since i've removed all but the top leaves. I may see how it goes and then next spring cut it down to a quarter near the base if no significant improvement.

[RogerBacardy]

Cordyman's first thread! To quote Fatboy Slim: "you've come a long way, baby"

How's this cordyline (and your front garden in general) looking now? Did you end up decapitating it? As you no doubt already know, they hate being moved once they start to get a trunk as they send down multiple tap roots.

Personally, with lots of bad experience to guide me, I wouldn't bother trying to move one bigger than 5 ft. They're such bad transplanters, but otherwise such fast growers, that there's not much point. Still, it sounds like you got a lot of rootball, so there's hope for your one, and maybe it's now massive, fingers crossed.

Having grown cordylines for a long time, my own advice with the removal of old leaves is that if they come off with a gentle tug - pull them off, if they feel firmly attached but the leaf is brown - then cut it off close to the trunk. When the remaining bit of brown leaf is ready to be removed it will come off with a gentle tug.

The reason I make the distinction is that in the distant past, when I pulled off firmer ones (no innuendo intended), there was a ripping noise which seemed and looked like the outer layer of trunk being damaged, so I now only remove them when they're ready to go. Also, I don't remove the old brown leaves from Sep onwards, as those extra hanging leaves help to insulate the trunk against radiation frosts through winter.

[jungle jas]

I had one like that, it died! They don't like being moved. I would not cut the top off they take to long to recover. Leave it ti its own devices. It may shoot from the base if the top continues to decline.

Just realized this is an old thread. Please ignore the above.

[cordyman]

Cordyman's first thread! To quote Fatboy Slim: "you've come a long way, baby"

How's this cordyline (and your front garden in general) looking now? Did you end up decapitating it? As you no doubt already know, they hate being moved once they start to get a trunk as they send down multiple tap roots.

Personally, with lots of bad experience to guide me, I wouldn't bother trying to move one bigger than 5 ft. They're such bad transplanters, but otherwise such fast growers, that there's not much point. Still, it sounds like you got a lot of rootball, so there's hope for your one, and maybe it's now massive, fingers crossed.

Having grown cordylines for a long time, my own advice with the removal of old leaves is that if they come off with a gentle tug - pull them off, if they feel firmly attached but the leaf is brown - then cut it off close to the trunk. When the remaining bit of brown leaf is ready to be removed it will come off with a gentle tug.

The reason I make the distinction is that in the distant past, when I pulled off firmer ones (no innuendo intended), there was a ripping noise which seemed and looked like the outer layer of trunk being damaged, so I now only remove them when they're ready to go. Also, I don't remove the old brown leaves from Sep onwards, as those extra hanging leaves help to insulate the trunk against radiation frosts through winter.

Thanks Roger! It was my posting here about the cordy, which took my tropical interest to the next level I guess!


I'll finish this story off, but its a story of mass death

I trimmed the cordy and planted around it with washy's, and Phoenix canariensis_CIDP's, laid a big rock down too, looked great I thought.




Being naive and not knowing a thing about protecting, or the fact I should have planted Trachys not cidps and washys, my first adventure in tropicals left me with a grave yard after winter! Death of everything....

.






he robustas - well not looking too good.

But it was this experience, along with moving to a new house, along with this forum, which spurred me onto researching truly hardy exotics, and is the foundation of my passion for it today