Encephalartos eugene-maraisii offset removal

[Brian]

One of my 12 year old seed grown Encephalartos eugene-maraisii was producing way too many offsets so last September I decided to remove the offsets. To do this I removed the plant completely from the garden and washed off all the dirt to see how best to cut off the pups. The connection points were actually quite small and could easily be cut off with a sharp chisel with amazing little damage.

Once removed, I soaked them in a fungicide solution and then allowed them to dry before adding a copper based fungicide and then tree pruning tar on the cuts.
I planted all the pups in perlite for a few months and returned the main caudex to its garden location.

Now, 10 months later the main caudex is finally starting to flush again. 
I’m not sure if removing the whole plant was the best way to do this but it's good to know it’s still alive. 
How do you guys remove your offsets?

[Tracy]

I have never dug out the parent plant but instead excavate around the pup to be removed.   I avoid removing pups when in flush or coning.  Once I have a good visual on the attachment point I use a sharp chisel to separate pup from main caudex much as you describe.   I used to use a tar sealant as taught by a mentor but stopped when my new advisor pointed out the risk of sealing in bad things that might stimulate rot.  Being in a dry climate, I leave the hole I excavated to remove the pup open to allow the wound to have airflow and callous on its own.  

The newly removed pups get their leaves trimmed either completely off or I keep a few that have been cut back to about 1/3 their normal length.  This is to allow the pups caudex to minimize energy going to support leaves and focus it's energy on root establishment.   I should probably clean the pups and use an antifungal but often don't use the antifungal before planting in a heavy or pure pumice soil. 

I recently did this with some Encephalartos nubimontanus pups but put two directly into the ground instead of pumice.  One of the two in ground is the first to flush of the batch removed.

My first removal was a large 10" caudex pup where I was more of an assistant to George Sparkman.  I did the digging and watched his technique and saw the tools he used to separate the pup.  I think there are photos of that event somewhere on this forum.  That plant actually has several pups that I would like to remove again which are now quite large.

[Brian]

Thanks for your description of the process. Next time I think I’ll skip the tree tar and see if I can get them to callous on their own. Also, the pups I planted in pure perlite held way too much moisture. Next time I’m going to use pumice for the pups.