ughhh how come this always happens?!

[sucuz]

Originally Posted by justatypn

The most puzzling is the ones that shoot legs off old stringy roots, hate to disturb those but when you cut the root back to the plant and it's not fresh by any means but can still produce an off-spring root ... orchids never cease to amaze me

Yeah, this happens to some of my plants also. So what do you do? Just trim back to the new root growth and leave the rather sad (unhealthy?) root above it, or cut off the whole thing? In the case of rescues, you don't always have a whole lot of useable roots to start with.