I would love both of your gingers. I have tons of muscadine vines, and beautyberry bushes. I also have 32 varieties of mint plants. I have hillary's sweet lemon, lavender, lime, orange, chocolate, wild berries, and basil rooted already...But I can root any others within a few weeks time. Thank you!

I agree with the others, put it back in the pot and secure it well so it does not move around. Preferably not by compacting the soil. Use some of that green plastic tape and clip the ends to the side of the pot so that it's secure or use a stake, but I personally think stakes are a pain and require constant baby sitting. I would soak it in 1/4 tsp. per gallon of Superthrive over night or at least for a few hours or just water it with that, then leave it alone until you see leaves. I would also not put it in the full sun since it is dehydrated. Humid, warm and filtered sun, away from rain. I would or wrap it with some wet paper towels for a couple of hours each day to plump it up. Once it gets roots, it will plump up. The race begins.... will it root before it gets into trouble. I hope so! 4 months is a long time to root. It may be a very hard variety to root or maybe the conditions just weren't right. You have had it inside, in the air conditioning? If so, I would get it out of the A/C and outside where the rain can't get to it. I had one similar to yours and did what yours is doing and now it's nice and plump and beginning to put out lots of leaves and roots. I had some cuttings in the hot garage in damp mulch, letting them callus. That one got buried and I didn't see it. When I found it, it was callused and root nubs were bulging but it was severely wrinkled and dehydrated. It's fine now. Also Root Excelerator is pricey but a little goes a long way and lasts for 2-3 years. They say one year after it's opened but if you keep it in a cool place it lasts a lot longer and still works. It makes roots grow so fast you can almost see them grow. I use it on every rooted cutting that I receive and ones that I root as soon as they begin to show the root nubs. http://www.house-garden.us/products/additives/roots-excelurator/

In browsing this forum I found what I think I have here. It's Curcuma caesia, or hidden ginger, a kind of brownish black tumeric. Can anyone confirm this?

Your pictures look like "common Ginger," AKA "true ginger" or "Canton ginger", scientific name "Zingiber officinale." It's the ginger you get as fresh ginger root at the grocery store. That's what I grow. I grow all my ginger plants in containers, so everything I have any given year is "first year growth." I harvest everything from my containers and I save some "seed rhizomes" from the first plant or two that die back and go dormant every year. My "first year" ginger plants nearly always bloom, and blooms range in color from white to orange to deep red to purple. From my own experience, I think the color of the blooms has more to do with chemistry than genetics. Plants grown in identical growing mix and fertilized with identical fertilizer tend to have the same coloration to the blooms. Of course, I don't always use the same growing mix for all my plants, so I get some variety in the blooms on mine.