What happened?!

I walked into my lath house to water my shade plants and discovered that one of my three Epiphyllums (aka orchid cacti) had fallen from its pot.  All three were mounted in relatively small pots attached to the side of an upper shelf to allow their leaves to dangle freely.

The other 2 Epiphyllums still sit neatly in their pots

I've never labeled these plants and I mixed up the order in which they were placed when my husband was renovating the lath house this summer so I'm not absolutely sure which is which but, based on the color of its foliage, I believe the one that lost its perch was 'King Midas'.

For lack of another place to put the uprooted plant, I dropped it into a shady spot in an empty container nearby

  

This photo shows a sparse root system at its base

So what made it fall to the ground while the pot remained in place?  The photo above suggests that it didn't have a deep root system.  We've been getting frequent bouts of high winds so that, along with its very long leaves, may have been enough to carry it aloft without a strong root system to hold it in place.  The soil in that pot was also unusually wet, which can't be the result of rain (as we've only had a trace amount) but then perhaps I overwatered it myself during a prior spin through the lath house.  The pots do have reservoirs at their base, although that's never been a issue in the five-plus years I've used them.  (I checked the other two pots to make sure they were okay, which they were; however, both the other Epiphyllums can probably use pruning too.)

The next question is: what should I do with the plant?  It produced lovely, if not prolific, flowers for me in the past.

I took a photo of this flower in mid-June when the pot was sitting under the Magnolia tree while my husband was busy with his lath house repairs

I've never propagated an Epiphyllum so I decided to make an experiment of it.  First, I pruned the plant with the intention of repotting it once I get another bag of succulent mix.

Mother plant after pruning

I watched a couple of videos on propagating Epiphyllums before cutting the best of the pruned pieces to the appropriate size (i.e. no longer than six inches).  I intend to let the cuttings callus over before giving two different approaches to growing them a try.

The most common approach is to plant the callused cuttings in moist but free-draining soil but another video poster advocated rooting the callused stems in water before potting them

If you've tried either of these approaches with Epiphyllums, let me know.

All material © 2012-2025 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party