Offset

(1) Offset or Offshoot [ Botany ]
Adjective: Offsetting
Synonym: Pup, Proliferation.

Dictionary of botanic terminology - index of names


	An offset or offshoot is new shoot, branch or stem or a whole young rooted plant produced by the main stem of the parent , usually starting from an axillary-bud at the plant base or from a rhizome or tuber.

The offset remains connected to the main plant but easily fall off and, taking root and continuing to grow as an individual new plant.
Offshoot are common source for vegetative propagation of plants. (e.g. Echinopsis)

(2) Offsetting habit [ Habit of growth - Morphology ]

Mammillaria luethyi

	An offsetting habit is a vegetative features that describe a plant forming offsets, shoot, branch or stem and eventually an open clumps or groups of shoots.
	Compare with: Solitary habit, Clumping habit
Left: a stem with basal offsets of *Mammillaria luethyi*

(3) Offset or Offshoot [ Botany ]


	A small bulb at the base of a mother bulb.

(4) To offset or To offshoot (verb.) [ Botany ]


	To produce offsets.

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Holdfast roots [ Botany ]
Dictionary of botanic terminology - index of names

Some species of climbing plants develop holdfast roots which help to support the vines on trees, walls, and rocks. By forcing their way into minute pores and crevices, they hold the plant firmly in place.

Climbing plants, like the poison ivy (Toxicodendron radicans), Boston ivy (Parthenocissus tricuspidata), and trumpet creeper (Campsis radicans), develop holdfast roots which help to support the vines on trees, walls, and rocks. By forcing their way into minute pores and crevices, they hold the plant firmly in place. Usually the Holdfast roots die at the end of the first season, but in some species they are perennial. In the tropics some of the large climbing plants have hold-fast roots by which they attach themselves, and long, cord-like roots that extend downward through the air and may lengthen and branch for several years until they strike the soil and become absorbent roots.

Major references and further lectures:
1) E. N. Transeau “General Botany” Discovery Publishing House, 1994