33 replies to this topic

[MushLuvR]

^^ AbSolutely... I wish the world could get to a place where you can openly discuss and talk about the problems of the world, humanity, technology, etc... without an argument or fight breaking out.  We are in the communication era, yet ironically, we are POOR communicators even with all the gadgets we all should probably let go.  Why we all carry around thousand-dollar phones still baffles me, yet I have one (I held out for years but succumbed to needing one for my business).  What happen to calling someone up from a LAN line and saying HEY... Let's go fishing, smoke a joint and catch something (at least a buzz) ... Anyway, I'm way off topic, but without fixing or acknowledging humanitarian problems and progressing in that sense, we might as well be dinosaurs walking the earth.  <rant off>  I just wanted to say I really appreciate the constructive back and forth replies and the Class that is or was shown.  One MushLuv

[JanSteen]

Guys, I honestly thought I was being a little blunt at first. Cultural differences and all.. Here in Northern Europe we tend to say things as they find a place in our brains, not how the message is best served to others.

Glad to be of help!

 

I took the liberty to do two things:

1. Set up an experiment with my own coca plants to see if cuttings are still something I can't do. This is an extremely frustrating process for me because there hasn't been one single plant in the world I haven't been able to propagate.

Right now I'm in the process of using another bunch of media - no tissue culture this time but a whole heap of antibiotics though - to see if I can get cuttings to root before they collapse, and hopefully write up a protocol.

 

2. I snapped a pic of the underside of a leaf, so that we can all have a bit more luck in ID'ing these plants. The two stripes next to the central vein/rib are clearly visisble.

[YoshiTrainer]

JanSteen, have you tried marcot/air layering of your bush?

Those two lines on the back of the leaf are interesting, I wonder what purpose they serve in nature?

Do you know which species has the strongest alkaloid content?

Thank you!

[Coopdog]

I have to wonder, only because they look virtually identical other than those two light lines, that I wonder if the age of these has anything to do with it? My friend told me he has had this bush for almost 20 years. They look damn similar on the backside anyhow. I'm going to grow them out and try to ID them with a few plant apps. 

[JanSteen]

I have to wonder, only because they look virtually identical other than those two light lines, that I wonder if the age of these has anything to do with it? My friend told me he has had this bush for almost 20 years. They look damn similar on the backside anyhow. I'm going to grow them out and try to ID them with a few plant apps. 

My bushes are about 10 years old now and morphologically only the first two leafs of a seedling are different.
The newest set of leaves is on green tissue, everything below that set of leaves is already woody. It's been like that for the past 10 years in both novo and coca. The glossyness of your foliage and the thickness of the stem relative to the foliage seems to be different as well, on top of the leathery dull look of mine compared to the shiny waxy look of yours. I'm still hoping for you though.

If your friends plants are over 5 years old, they should have flowered at least once. The flowers can give hints towards a solid ID as well.

 

 

JanSteen, have you tried marcot/air layering of your bush?

Those two lines on the back of the leaf are interesting, I wonder what purpose they serve in nature?

Do you know which species has the strongest alkaloid content?

Thank you!

I've tried everything, including air layering, a couple dozen tissue culture recipes, suspended cell culture, hydroponic cloning, cuttings in various media.. I managed to grow entire citrus plants from single cells on the tissue culture media, so I'm fairly sure that I'm dealing with auxin resistant plants. Could have been caused by the US spraying entire coca fields with leftover Agent Orange, which is known to contain 2,4-dichlorophenoxy acetic acid, which is a synthetic auxin that acts as a defoliant when used  in excess.

Truxiliense seems to have the highest reported alkaloid content but I know there are wild plants in the family that exceed the cultivated ones. Those however rarely show up in literature because they're already endangered, and making those records public would mean they're going to be harvested from the wild.
 

[Coopdog]

Jansteen, I am so glad you came into this thread. Regardless of the legitimacy of my cuttings, it has been a very interesting learning experience. 

[Coopdog]

Ok, one more tidbit of useful information. My friend searched and searched and finally dug this up. Jansteen he also sends his heartfelt appreciation for correcting him as well. This is what I have I am about 99% certain. 

 

Erowid Coca (Erythroxylum coca) Vault : This is Not Coca: Comments on a plant (Synadenium grantii) passed off as coca

[JanSteen]

Wow yeah, that would explain a lot! I've seen ficuses being sold as coca plants here in Europe, but they too have the weird latex sap. I think I have never encountered any bleeding from my own plants, so I think the sap would be transparent in coca.

[Coopdog]

Jansteen, have you considered trying to graft it to another plant? Just an idea. 

[JanSteen]

That's a good idea Coopdog! I haven't tried it because it's nearly impossible to find receiving plants that are genetically close enough for the graft to connect well. Most of the related families are endemic to south america and I don't really expect my buddies over there to get out in the wild to find species that are even hard to find through google.

But, I remember back in the days that I have read something about blueberries being the closest relative that are frost-resistant. So I might give that a try next summer.

 

The issue with my coca plants is their general resistance to auxins, this means they have a hormonal disbalance that makes callus formation difficult and that they have serious issues rooting and connecting at a graft site.

 

But while writing this down I remember another trick that might work. When air layering we usually peel off some bark and expose the wood beneath it. Or we make a one-sided wedge cut and peel that open and jam some moss in there.

But what about splitting a branch, jamming a peg in there and wrapping that in moss?

Anyways, I'm off getting my scalpel.

[JanSteen]

Update on the cuttings I took over a month ago; sphagnum and pumice cuttings are still alive. The ones in akadama, peat, cotton wool, coco coir and some other substrates have died.

[JanSteen]

12 months after striking, it's producing foliage but no roots. Same as always. Now it's waiting time until it spent all its energy and dies.

[Juthro]

Sorry about your troubles, that has to be frustrating as hell.  If I missed it above I apologize, but have you tried using commercial rooting hormones'? 

 

In the past I've done a fair amount of work with hard to root woody stemmed plants at my parents nursery, and my general results tend to range from not good to complete failure.  I had my best luck with the use of a liquid hormone solution containing NNA, and then placed in spangnum. 

Edited by Juthro, 13 March 2023 - 05:01 PM.

[JanSteen]

Sorry about your troubles, that has to be frustrating as hell.  If I missed it above I apologize, but have you tried using commercial rooting hormones'? 

 

In the past I've done a fair amount of work with hard to root woody stemmed plants at my parents nursery, and my general results tend to range from not good to complete failure.  I had my best luck with the use of a liquid hormone solution containing NNA, and then placed in spangnum. 

It was frustrating, nowadays I just accept the outcome and give it a try every year for shits and giggles.

I've tried every hormone available, from IAA, IBA, NAA to 2,4-D and coconut water. Close to 200 different concentrations and recipes. The only conclusion I can draw is that this is one of the round-up resistant coca plants, that's insensitive to auxins.