ongoing biweekly cloning attempts and failures

Clone King

pinkus said:

Hey Paulie, I noticed in a post you mentioned being able to pull the cut out of perlite to check it. TOUCHING is one of the big reasons clones fail. As soon as newbies stop fondling the cuts, their failure rate plummets IME.

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Agree, I make an effort to touch or move them as much as possible. The pulling it out of perlite, I only did once I get to the 2 week mark, and im getting close to pulling the plug on that run, to see what the progress is, if any.

mean mr.mustard said:

Clone King

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Ive got the turboklone, all aero cloners are same principle ultimately I believe. Youll see that it was not a game changer for me, and just another method to try and get down and not that easy as always mentioned.

LOL.

Once is 100% too much.
Think of it as kissing a Covid 19 carrier.

Great thread-Another update.

The last time I took clones I tweaked a couple of things. As some others have mentioned:

The first 3 days have the dome on and vents closed. The 4th day the vents come open. The 6th day the dome is twisted so the bottom is not sealed and the clones get good air flow. By the 7th or 8th day the dome is completely off.

Whether the clones have roots coming out of the root cubes or not after 10 days they are transplanted into the 18oz cups with Ocean Forest soil (25% mix of perlite). If the clone is healthy after 10 days they seem to do just fine with the transplant. Eventually they will send out roots and put on new growth

Less seems to be more with cloning. Don't fret over them just set a routine and stick with it.

Thanks again for this thread.

hamstring said:

Update from my last post.

All of the cuttings that had any sign of a root all 100% made it. Just went into soil today. Could of and should of did it a 5 days ago but didn't have the time. Some of the roots were turning a bit brown but still plenty of white ones.

Like others have said don't fret too much. I let the rapid rooters dry out a couple of times and the cuttings wilted. A little bit of water and they perked right up.

Not sure but I'm thinking less light is better. The next time I clone if the cutting hasn't wilted I'm going to keep it even it doesn't show roots in 10 days.

I have a OGKB cut that was gifted by a fellow IC mager. Thanks brother I want to get her cloned so I can put her int flower. onward and upward.

Thanks for this thread I have learned a lot and still have a lot more to learn.

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first time cloning and used clonex and rapid rooters and humidity dome got roots at 8 days in 3 and then next day roots showed in rest of them. used the humidity dome with the bottom extension holes that can open close on both parts. followed guide on youtube left them closed first 2-3 days spraying them 3-4 times a day. then slowly opend them up. had trouble figuring out how to stand rapid rooters now(now i will place them upside down since thats what someone else did. instead i plaved each one in a shotglass and it worked out nice since i gues it held extra humidity in the bottom . tray had water in it collect over time so as to help humidity i guess. kept spraying the dome each day to keep humidity up. pretty stoked!

May not be exactly on topic but this thread has been berry berry good to me.

I have had some success transplanting my rapid rooters on day 10 into solo cups. Really no evidence of better survival rate. What I learned from this thread was less is more with cloning. Leave them alone.

Thats why at 10 days if they cuttings are not wilted I put the rapid rooters in to a solo cups full of ocean forest 75/25 with perlite (No dome). I don't have to check on them as much in the larger container. Its been working for me.

I had to go on a trip (famous last words of every failed grow) and I transplanted into the solo cups at 6 days. It has been 19 days in total and I lost a couple more but was expected.

Plants all look fine but zero new growth. Should I be worried?

I have massaged the the soil out of two of the solo cups and both had roots. Just a few roots straight to the bottom. I didn't see any side growth in the roots but I was not going to brake up root ball to check closely.

I saw this one other time in a clone. It had roots and even transplanted into a 1/2 gallon pot hoping that would help. Again roots grew but the plant never grew a millimeter. I new it was a freak but I even transplanted it outdoors. It was so sad seeing that little survivor never grow even with mother sun shining on it..

21 days and no new growth. Am I jumping the gun ? Just doesnt seem right. Has anyone else seen this phenomenon.?

Bueller? Bueller?

23 days and no growth.

No one has heard of this before ?

Depending on the environment some plants barely grow, especially newly rooted. What is your grow room environment like Hamstring?

I've been rooting cuts by snipping it dipping in aloe gel and then directly into soil in a small seed starter tray with a dome, I wiped the scissors down the first time with isopropyl but haven't since and haven't had any problems, I've pulled cuts out of the soil that only had nubs while others were rooted and placed them back in the soil and they ended up fine, I think the microbes in the soil help a lot instead of some super sterile inert medium

gsxr97 said:

Depending on the environment some plants barely grow, especially newly rooted. What is your grow room environment like Hamstring?

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Thanks for the reply.

I have a small cob style LED I think its 150watts. You can buy them at the big box store. Its in my 2x2x6 veg room ( just an old closet).

Its not air tight so its seeing the same climate thats in my house. That varies as we turn on and off the air conditioner depending on outside temp. In between 72-85 deg temp. Humidity varies largely depending on if the air conditioner is on. Normally my 150watt led is much closer to the plants ( 12" or less) but I moved it about 24-28" when I had larger veg plants in there.

I have throughly wetted the soil in the solo cups just once when the rapid rooters went in and as of today they still do not need to be watered again. The clones still look fine. I had a fan on them for a few days but have turned it off. Just playing with different ideas.

I am starting to think my light is to far away. I think I am seeing some stretching in the main stem. I may be imaging it but they look a little taller but still no side branch growth.

Really wanting to move the the large room into flower because I just got a cut of GG4 and want to see if I have the real deal. Off topic but man that GG4 is a vigorous bitch out growing everything in the room. Topped it twice will have to top the shit out of it agin before flowering.

25 days seems like a lot of time especially because some of the plants I have cloned a couple times before and it never took this long. Again it could also have something to do with the early transplant . Just weird but I dont have years of experience with cloning and was looking for some input.

FWIW I found that spraying the clones twice a day with water helped. Until roots start its the only ways the clones can drink per se..

Wanted to update the thread because it has been a learning tool for me and hope in some way this can help someone else.

It has now been 31 days since I took the cuttings and they are now just starting to show some very visible new growth. I am pretty sure the first real growth was at 26 days.

Doesn't that seem like a long time to see new growth? I hear other growers talking about roots in 5 days and new growth in 10.

What is the norm for rooted clones to to show new growth? Are there any other factors that affect it?

Is the time it takes strain related? Its interesting to me because even if the strain is hard to clone (i.e. show roots) does that mean new growth is also slow too.
Does the size and number of new roots on the clone effect it?

I have read many threads on cloning but not much talk about the time period between roots and new growth. In my mind that has to be important for plant management. I have a small flower room and I had to top twice and some plants need to be toped again to allow for stretch.

Wanted to give a final update to close this thread.

I have had very good success with my latest LOW EFFORT Technique.

I have found that most things I was worrying about were not detrimental to success. So Im posting to prove that even in these conditions everything is fine.

So here we go

1" rockwool cubes, dunked in regular Tap water, with 5ml/gallon Hormex. NO PH ADJUST (TAP is 7.4-7.8), NO NUTRIENTS,over the course of rooting, I resoak the cubes in the same water mixed on day 1 to 100% water holding capacity, maybe 2-3 times.

I do 4 cuttings per 1 cube! Each corner gets one. I do not worry about the size of the cuttings or how many leaves.

In dome with both vents 100% open from day 1, no daily air exchange or extra venting. I don't even know what the RH is in the dome, I just know my room is 55%RH, dome stays on until rooted, for simplicity (I just don't care, and its been working fine), and never sprayed them once.

Temps are 65F on average, fluctuating between 60 (lights off) and 70 (Lights on PEAK)

They are on the edge of the veg room, and I have measured with a lux meter they are getting 2-3K LUX! That is basically indirect indoor window lighting. VEG is on 18/6


I also use a rusty razor blade, laying around in the room for a few years, and don't wash my hands, sometimes using just scissors to make the cut.

So thats it, I appreciate everyone's help, ultimately I was overcomplicating it, and making mistakes trying to follow techniques that were ment for fastest rooting etc. But for me, it didn't matter that it takes 7 days or 14, or even 21 (I see roots popping between D10-D20), as long as it roots eventually, and during that time, it is low effort, where I can basically forget about it).

and I get insane scarring and tonnes of roots popping out of the stem, and I don't do any stem scraping.

I have finally found my tech that works for me and my environment, and it will keep all my rooms full and popping, I will not get into a rut after discovering this way.

THANKS guys...