Wisteria air layer

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Omono
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I have a large Chinese wisteria that blooms regularly every year. However, it has a couple of nasty wounds dating from its days in my neighbors yard. I have finally accepted that these will never heal over, at least in my lifetime. It also has some ugly roots. So I am considering air layering it above the the uppermost wound which will still give me a decent trunk without the wounds and nasty roots. My question is how well do these air layer? Second, assuming I do succeed in getting a new root system, how will doing this affect the flowering? I mean will losing the old root system essentially reset it and mean I have to wait another 10 years for it to start flowering again? Here is a photo of it for reference.

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nuttiest

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Supposedly if it has been flowering it stays flowering, so even a cutting would have the required hormone.
Why can't you just cut the ugly part off and prune strangling roots? Looks like a great tree.
 

Shibui

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The tree is mature enough to flower. New roots will not affect maturity or flowering just as growing cuttings or grafting will produce mature, flowering specimens in a year or 2.
It is possible that stress from layering may cause it to miss flowering for a year (that sometimes happens after repotting too) but will definitely not revert to juvenile.
Wisteria root easily as cuttings and layers so go right ahead.
 

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Supposedly if it has been flowering it stays flowering, so even a cutting would have the required hormone.
Why can't you just cut the ugly part off and prune strangling roots? Looks like a great tree.
I probably could cut out the nasty roots that circle the base of the trunk. The old wounds are mostly just above the base and also about 1/2 way up. So I was thinking or air layering at the halfway point. That will still give me a 2” dia trunk and a total height of over 2’. I’d also like to get it into a smaller pot—that one weighs a ton and I have to haul it down the hill to the garage every spring to avoid freezes. However the flowers are nice—about 40 blossoms on it right now about the size of a walnut each so flowers in about a month as long as daytime temps stay in the 60s.
 

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To me, big layer = big problems later. If it has great roots but the underground wound does not heal, it is tough fighting disease that enters from under crown. You could arguably get a more robust trees over the years by starting smaller with some varieties.
I feel like that top right branch cut clean for cascade, or exactly where you want to cut in the middle, and spend its grow out energy this year on healing a big wound, not an air layer wound then another year after that. Once they get hard by trying to section off wood it is harder to heal later. Anyone else feel this way about big layers?
Anyway, I would chop where you want on that beautiful trunk, redirect or prune at least one circling root, and use all the material for cuttings, even pot any root prune which are generally successful on wisteria in spring.
 

nuttiest

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Shibui is right about the small cuttings taking a few years, I was thinking about a tropical tree.
 

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I also will keep the base a while, it might sprout new branches. With this early spring it should be finished blooming in a month so I should be able to start the air layer in early April and have it rooted by mid-summer.
 

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Wow, I don't even have buds yet on 2 varieties.
 

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Wow, I don't even have buds yet on 2 varieties.
The big one has 45 flowers buds expanding every day and a smaller one has 35–they are both reliable bloomers and are 10-15 years old each.
 

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Finally hauled these guys up the hill to their benches and snapped some photos.

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And now we’re at about the peak. These have been inside for a week to survive the cold wave so this really is the first year I have seen them this nice. Last year a late freeze killed the flowers and I only had a few in mid-summer.

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