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[mj]

any coffee growers here? I am interested in Robusta coffee and if it will grow significantly faster than Psychotria Alba. My plan is that if Robusta coffee does in fact grow faster than P.Alba then it might make a good grafting root stock for P. Viridis which is very slow to grow. P. Alba is probably one of the fastest growing Psychotria so if coffee grows faster than P. Alba it would be of real interest.
   I know one of the members here at STS plans in the spring to graft P.Viridis onto P. Alba to make the Viridis grow faster. I am wondering if Robusta coffee would be an even faster growing root stock option. Any comments thoughts and or ideas would be most welcome. I believe that P. Viridis has been grafted onto P. Alba roots but I have not found any discussion of P. Viridis being grafted onto Coffee but since there is no commercial value to doing so this come as no surprise. Best regards mj.

[Bach]

The only coffee plant I ever grew was perhaps somewhere between alba and viridis in terms of rate of growth. If we want a truly fast growing stock somebody needs to try kratom. 

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[mj]

Thanks Bach. How would you describe the growth rate of your Kraton plants compared to P. Alba?
   Curious to know if others who have grown both Kratom and Psychotria Alba could comment on the comparative growth speeds of the two plants. If Kratom is substantially faster it would definitely be of interest as a grafting root stock for P. Varidis, but if Kratom is not much faster growing than than P. Alba I might just as well stick with P. Alba as a root stock for grafting especially since it is such a close match to P. Varidis and since I already have P. Alba on hand. Thanks for any input. Best regards mj.

[modern]

The growth rate of kratom is insane. If you give it a large enough pot with lots of water and nutes it will grow VERY quickly; much quicker than alba

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[mj]

Thanks Modern appreciate the input.  has anybody here used Kratom as a root stock for Psychotria Viridis? Best regards mj.

[Urban Elements]

I'm waiting for my grafting scissors & rooted viridis to arrive, then I will try again.

I tried this with a basic notch cut, and the Viridis died a week later.

From what my buddy overseas tells me that the "V" notch works best for kratom. I have both "V" & "U" snips in the mail.

I will report back with pictures as this progresses.

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[mj]

there are you tube videos of all manner of different grafting techniques. Looking forward to your experiment. You might consider an "approach graft" that way both plants stay healthy while the graft takes hold and establishes itself. Best regards mj.

PS; I posted a video of a coffee plantation doing grafts of coffee onto root stock and they did a very basic style of graft they made sure the plant being grafted onto the root stock  had at least 5 - 6 nodes and they removed all the leaves then placed it all into a low light very damp hot room for two weeks.

Video is here: http://sharetheseeds.me/forum/index.php?topic=2998.0

[Auxin]

If Psychotria were grafted to kratom, at some future point someone might mistakenly mix the resulting Psychotria leaves with MAOI.
Psychotria leaves that may contain kratom alkaloids or some biotransformed analogs thereof.
Would it even be safe to make such a graft?

[mj]

the plant that is grafted onto the different root stock retains it own characteristics. there are for example many citrus fruit and apples and coffees grown on hardier or more resistant root stock this way each grafted plant is maintained as if it were still growing with its own natural roots. Someone did mention that there is some small percentage of DNA exchange but it is very small. When I was  kid a neighbor had an apple tree which had grafted to it golden delicious red delicious macintosh and some other apples and you could not tell the were the real thing just growing on a donor root stock. Best regards mj. 

[Auxin]

But the root stock for a grafted apple tree isnt a deadly poison, its another apple.
Alkaloids can be transported from stock to scion, especially if the alkaloid or some relevant precursor is made by the roots.
If you get an arm transplant and drink some whiskey, your new arm will get drunk too 

[mj]

But the root stock for a grafted apple tree isnt a deadly poison, its another apple.
Alkaloids can be transported from stock to scion, especially if the alkaloid or some relevant precursor is made by the roots.
If you get an arm transplant and drink some whiskey, your new arm will get drunk too 

I am not an expert but this is not my understand of this at all. You cannot eat the leaves of a tomato plant they are poisonous but you can eat the fruit all day long. You can eat the stalks of a  Rhubarb (mmmm) plant but the leaves are poisonous. Perhaps someone with some training can step in here and explain. I am pretty sure that grafting like this is a safe thing to do. Best regards mj.

[Bach]

I don't know if any research has been done to say that Mitragyna makes the alks in it's roots and then translocates them upward. Or by extension that Pv does the same.

It's my understanding (which could be utterly wrong) that the signature alkaloids of each species are biosynthesized in situ in the leaves.

[Auxin]

You cannot eat the leaves of a tomato plant they are poisonous but you can eat the fruit all day long. You can eat the stalks of a  Rhubarb (mmmm) plant but the leaves are poisonous.

You can eat the leaves of tomato, its a myth that they are poisonous- they just taste like goat vomit boiled in a rusty iron pot The primary alkaloid responsible for that, tomatine, is also in green tomatoes and theyre edible too, just... goat vomit. Frying, fermenting, or ripening the fruit breaks down the tomatine enough to remove the metallic bitter taste.
You got the music partly right tho, in some plants toxins are confined to one location. But in others they are transported, and in some a precursor is made in one spot and transformed further in another. Take tomato and belladona. A tomato grafted to belladonna stock will make deadly tomatoes, but grafting belladonna to tomato will reportedly make nearly non-toxic belladonna.
The point is its unknown how a situation in which Psychotria were grafted to kratom would play out. It would seem unwise, or at least hazardous, to make the gamble.

[mj]

if that is the case then I stand corrected and I apologize for posting in error. It is not likely that there is a lot of such work having being done on Psycotria Viridis or its brother and sister species as there simply would be little or no commercial interest/value. We might find some record of such tests being done on Coffee plants. Since Coffee is closely related to Psychotria Viridis would it or could it be reasonable to draw parallels?I will take some time and see if I can find if there have been any studies like that. I suppose that from a practical point of view that one could graft Viridis onto Kratom and take the leaf orally since an maoi is required to prevent the Viridis from being destroyed in the stomach then If Kratom affects were noted it could only be from the Kratom alkaloids having passed from the root to the grafted leaf. Do you think that there would be a safety problem as people do take the leaf of Kratom in small quantities as a stimulant? Let me dig around and see what I can find but I am not a researcher so forgive me if I am on the slow side or am not as thorough as I should be. Best regards mj.

This is an interesting article which would likely be applicable to Psychotria as it is very close to Coffee. I still think it would be reasonable to attempt to graft Psychotria onto Kratom and see what happens.
    I have not yet been able to establish which coffee(s) are the fastest growing plants which is of interest to me for root stock grafting to attempt to grow Psychotria Viridis more quickly.
http://scialert.net/fulltext/?doi=ajar.2014.150.163&org=12

[Bach]

Mj I think that would be an excellent way to get some indication of where the alkaloids originate. The only problem I see is a practical one: holding Pv leaves in the cheek long enough to get effects will be difficult since raw Pv leaves are so incredibly bitter. Like to the point where it burns. PV is why ayahuasca brews taste bad. Caapi only brews actually taste kinda good, some of them really good.

Another possible complication is if DMT is present in the leaves it can be absorbed as well, so distinguishing the effects of the kratom alks from DMT would prove... interesting.