How to divide this mounted monster Schom. tibicinis
 

Well this huge guy (tibicinis) is growing on my tree - and tbh I have no clue how even to approach dividing because the bulbs don’t even seem to come from a rhizome. FYI the larger bulbs are the size of my forearm. I’ll try to get a closer picture on a ladder - but the bulbs all are squished together and beyond cutting through some I don’t know how to “split” it

https://i.imgur.com/XKaEPmW.jpg

It is a beauty! I would have left it the way it is, by the way.

Good luck ;-)

I mostly want to divide because it's growing "up" the tree. I just want to take off maybe some of the bottom portion since those are old bulbs, and it's not getting any new bulbs at the bottom.

I would leave it as is if it was growing symmetrically

Well, there definitely is a rhizome in there. You'll find it when you get eyeball to eyeball with it. Thinking about attacking it from a ladder makes me dizzy... How to divide? VERY carefully, with somebody to hold the ladder for you. A serrated knife can be handy.

Do you want to divide it to get divisions, or do you just want to remove old bulbs?

I think I've posted this story before but the year Glen Decker announced he was selling his business he gave a demonstration by dividing a giant Schom. with a Sawzall and throwing divisions out to the audience at his last open house.

1- you almost cannot hurt that plant
2- dont divide it- the shows you will get once it starts back growing will be epic!!!! and it will spike down from there too!

I think I would just leave it as is. But to each their own. Diving it shouldn't be much of a problem.
First off I would get it down from the tree. With a sharp knife cut through the roots and close to the bark as possible. Once you cut the roots around the outer edges of the plant it should be as simple as a firm yank to pull the plant off the tree. If it breaks, no problem since you want to make some divisions. Once it's down you should have an easier time of getting to the stems that connect the individual bulbs from the back side. Ideally I think you would want to time this with the development of new growth so that once remounted it will get new roots soon. Here in Costa Rica that time would be right now, not sure if it's the same where you are.

You use a rock drill to bore a hole to the center.
Insert one stick of dynamite.
Light the fuse and take cover.

:rofl:

I have grown hefty schomburkia on queen palms in South FLA and would not recommend trying to separate from tree, Bulbs are big but hollow and ants like to nest in them and pollinate endless blooms as they open. Best way would be to get a solid butter knife and after soaking roots for a while, try to pry it under the roots on the outside of the clump and work your way towards the center until you have a big enough bunch of bulbs that you can wiggle to loosen more roots to the point that the whole mass is separated from trunk. Some roots will be lost. Frankly I placed mine at a height that the automatic water sprinklers would reach it after I added an extension and it totally wrapped around the trunk even with hardly any fertilizer.
I would leave it alone. By removing it and chopping pieces off and than reattaching it you will be setting the plant back substantially. Will search for some of my older pics to give you a view to what they can become.

Here are a couple of pics from chunk of queen palm cutoff as the palm died but schomburkia was doing great and wrapped around trunk. Trunk was about 12 inches plus diameter and it took two strong guys to move this thing.
I remember taking 3 pics to get all sides of plant, trunk was 4.5 ft tall. I sold that residence in 2015 and have driven by on my occasional trip down south and the other schombos on the remaining queen palms are much bigger than this.

That's huge!

To a certain extent I'm also planning on having to take the tree down eventually (roots are cracking my retaining wall), so good to see your experience. How high up was the plant on the palm? I have a couple queens out front, and didn't realize they attached so well to them, but would have to figure out irrigation.

If you can tap into an existing sprinkler system, get the appropriate adaptor, run 1/4 inch tubing with low flow mister or sprayer (or more than one, strategically placed) up the tree, above the plant. Gravity will take care of the rest.

Well, as Roberta pointed out I used the existing sprinkler system in place in my lawn. Extended vertically one of the heads in the landscape island with the three queen palms about 5 feet and then used a full circle spray head with internal filter to catch the liquified limestone. That upward spray caught all three palms and plants around the island. A smaller diameter tubing (1/4 inch) would have failed due to clogging.
My sprinkler system was sourced by a well and cleaning out the spray heads even with a in line filter was a regular chore for me.
found a pic of the island with an initial riser that only reached two of the schombos, I eventually extended it further to cover all 3 plants

BTW, on lower right side you see a boulder that has a massive encyclia ciliare growing on a rock, this makes it a lithophyte plant, same boulder used to have E tampensis growing on side, but they got crowded out.
https://i.postimg.cc/hjvh8HCc/3.jpg



here is E. ciliare in a clearer picture
https://i.postimg.cc/XqFx5Knc/Epi-ciliare-rock.jpg