I notice a lot of you have been battling the rot with Comet. I have to say it really hasn't been a big help here. On the other hand, when I have had rot on the mother and not on the increases the following has really worked well. I dig out all the soft rot I can from the rhizome, then I dig around the rhizome so that all areas cleaned of rot are exposed to air. I then drench the rhizome and the soil beneath it with a 20-30 percent bleach to water solution. Yes this is higher than the 10% that all the books say, but the 20 to 30% has never killed a single rhizome. And it really cleans the soil of fungus. After the beach wash I let the rhizome dry and scab over before putting soil back around it. So far it has worked very well in my humid climate.
This year I also tried the aspirin dissolved in water on Darcy's Choice. The middle fan had rotted and fallen over. I cleaned it up with bleach. Then, a few days later, when it still looked poorly, I drenched it with the aspirin dissolved in water. Between the two something worked. It survived the fall and winter and the new increases are growing like crazy. I think the big "extra" was keeping soil away for long enough to let the wound scab over really well.
