Failing Clones

i love cali

Active Member
So i have been trying to cut clones off a plant that i have had for a long time with no success. Here's the situation. I always do all the normal things like cut them off the plant at the right spot, use a sterile environment, cut them underwater, use a rooting hormone, use a dome with adequate humidity, and use the 1 inch rock wool cubes. But for some reason every time i leave the clones in the corner of my room for 1 1/2 weeks they end up getting really swollen and bumpy where the roots should be growing. (I have a bunch so i pull one up every now and again to see why its not rooting). I have no idea why this keeps happening and i cant find any information about it. I have tried a few in soil but to no avail.

Some of the problems i think it might be are......1) The plant im getting the cuttings from has some kind of nutrient that is not allowing it to root(Nitrogen?).2)the rock wool cubes themselves are not warm enough. 3) PH could be off. Those are all the things i was thinking it could be.

If anybody could help me at all on this it would be MUCH appreciated. Thank You for taking the time to listen to my problems as it seems many other don't take the time to do this nowadays regardless of the topic.

kiss-assJust thought that was cool
 
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fureelz

Guest
you should shave some of the stem only exposing the white fleshy part atleast 1/2" up....great success!
 

GreenphoeniX

Well-Known Member
This is something I posted on another thread a few days ago, maybe something here can help you a bit:

Some basic cloning tips:

- The lower on the plant you take the clones from, the easier they are to get rooted and get growing. Lower areas of the plant have the freshest hormones and therefore root a lot more readily than the top parts of the plant, which have their hormones focused on vegetative growth.
- Aeroponic cloners (such as EZ cloners) can be a great investment.
- Keep in high humidity until roots form.
- Make sure they have fresh air but not air blowing directly on them, that will dry them, making them transpire more - Bad.
- Use rooting hormone.
- Cut leaves in half to reduce transpiration.
- Cut out growing tips so the clone spends some time focusing its energy on growing some new roots instead of focusing on new vegetative growth. Make sure you cut off the growing tip just above a healthy node so that when roots form the plant has somewhere to grow it's fresh shoots from.
- Try different types of cuttings to find which works best for your strain (e.g - semi-hardwood, soft wood, stem tip cuttings etc. ... You know if you get really good you can get a leaf to grow roots! )

- The more research you do into it and the more experience you get with it, the easier it will become. There are a lot of plants out their that are a lot harder to take cuttings of than Cannabis.

Best of luck!

Some extras:

- Make the cut less than half a centimeter below a node. The nodes are where naturally occurring rooting hormones are most active within a plant. Some plants even contain preformed roots within nodes.
- Use a razor blade the lightly slice of a small slither of 'bark', this reveals the cambium layer and makes it easier for roots to 'break through' - Also, you can try splitting the stem 'vertically' by slicing down the middle with a razor blade, this reveals a larger surface area of cambium for roots to form from (don't slice more than a few millimeters past the node though), if you do this make sure everything is sterile as you also reveal more of the cambium layer to bacteria/infection.
 

i love cali

Active Member
Thank you for all the quick responses. I thought i would take a day or so. Who said pot smokers aren't productive? I heard that the clone were supposed get bumpy but these bumps never sprout roots. The stem get to be like 4 or 5 times its size with these weird hard swollen bumps. The eventually starts to turn yellow and die. I get too many bumps. I don't get it.
 

fdd2blk

Well-Known Member
you want them to dry out a little. this will help them grow roots faster. they send out roots to find water. if you let them dry somewhat it helps promote root growth. some people keep there cuttings too wet and it takes too long to root, then rot sets in.
 
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fureelz

Guest
Awesome - You know what kind of Ficus it was? ... Did you air-layer it or take stem cuttings?
I have no idea what kind it is it has 7 skinny straight leafs and I took a stem cutting. It was actually a friends who got it from work and he said they were expensive..ill get a pic soon if ya want its pretty neat


I don't think so but it is definitely a possibility. Thank You. I with get on the extra watering pronto.
no extra watering...less watering!



Are you using a powder? I've noticed the roots will lump more with them. Gels will evenly coat the stem and able to soak into that shaved part of the stem I recommended you try. I used to have pictures somewhere...idk tho. I think those grodan green cubes are the best for establishing root growth in a clone and you can make them hydro or soil down the road.
 

i love cali

Active Member
fureelz thank you for tour added info. I seem to agree with what you are saying about forcing them to root. Its almost like they are really stubborn ad need to see the face of death before deciding to root. Im using dip-n-grow which is a liquid concentrate and another little liquid hormone dip of some sort. And the watering it less would make more sense to me since i think i had them too moist before. Is putting the mini greenhouse thing outside a bad idea?
 
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fureelz

Guest
Is it a bad idea? kinda, do you run the risk of bugs? humidity in the dome is great, water in the tray is bad....if you are using those brown dirt cubes get them really wet then squeeze them out into a bucket or whatever, then they are ready for the clone..water once every 3 days. those green cubes are a little more airy and I lightly water once every 2 days.

along with shaving some of the outer stem off I cut little slices into the white fleshy part which seems to work. I haven't pulled one out to see if thats where they take root or not but I've had great success with this method.
 
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fureelz

Guest
How many clippings did you take off one plant? how tall was it before you clipped it? is it getting any taller now?
 
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