Hello I have reserva privada Sour Kush and getting to the size where I think I can start taking clones( almost 1.5 months old from fem seed). I am still in veg, should I take cuts know, or sould I put in flower and take the cuts with in the first week or two? I am not sure since the plant is from a femenized seed if it matters when to take the clones. I found a lot of info on when to take clones but couldnt find a specific answer on when to off a mother plant that was grow from femenized seeds. Any info would be great PEACE!!!!
You can take clones any time the plant has branches enough to cut. If you intend on keeping the plant as a /mother/ you wouldn't flower it at all. You would keep her vegging and take clones to flower, leaving the mother intact and vegging to continue to produce clones for future flowering.
Yes Thanks Mr. Meow. Thanks for the reply, I agree. Forgive me for sounding like a newbie but the clones I take off the mother would be female since the mother was grown from a femenizied seed? I would then just veg the clones like normal and flower accordingly. No need to worry that I may get a male in the bunch once I flower, unless they hermie. I did a lot of reading up on it, but a couple things just needed a lil clearing up. Any more info GraSSCITY would be great!!!
I had a related question about cloning. I was thinking about having a perpetual mother plant to take clones from but I am just curious what would be the best way to do this? Just get a small grow tent for her with a CFL on 24/7 to prevent the budding phase and just keep pruning her to keep her smaller and healthy? Just wanted to clear that up, already read a lot about cloning and have even made a cloning bubbler to make the cloning a little easier. Lots of people mentioned keeping a mother without ever budding her but just wanted to clear that up. Does the light need to be a 24/7? Can use a smaller CFL just to keep her going since not trying to get massive veg from her?
Still not got this quote thing figured; soundscience4.0 - When you cut and root a branch from a plant, it becomes a genetic copy of that plant, even retaining the mother's age. So if the mother plant was female and displaying preflowers, the clones could be flowered as soon as they were rooted, or you could veg them to desired height and then flower. greatkitsune - CFL would work fine, you most likely will have to LST the plant though, and it might grow slowly, but I vegged a mother for 9 weeks keeping her on the floor of the veg cab, 12" from the light, I got a few clones off her and she still has tons of branches for flowers (I did things backwards). Cannabis' flowering is controlled by hormones, when they reach a critical point in the plant, it senses this and starts flowering. These hormones are degraded by light, and faster than the plant makes them. The light wouldn't have to be 24/7, just enough to interrupt the dark period. It seems around 10 hours of consecutive dark too often is enough. I saw some people using -12 on, 6 off, 2 on, 6 off, repeat- schedule, maybe see if you can search those posts? I've never looked into that personally.
Ok so is a good idea to LST the mother? Is it just easier to manage it this way? Or is because this way I can keep her in a smaller tent? Also what would be a good wattage for the CFL? Something like a 75watt or smaller be sufficient since not looking to make her too big? Or would 100 watt be the minimum as I have heard in the growing discussions about CFL? Thinking the smaller lights around 40-50 would be best to just keep it alive and smaller growth... or is this just not enough light to keep healthy? For that matter would a smaller LED bulb be a better idea... Low wattage in the LED to keep the power usage really smaller since not looking for a real veg growth? Just keep the girl alive for long time low wattage... (( sorry really high right now trying to keep on topic and short)) and then just keep on a 18/6 would be sufficient and easier to deal with.
Greatkitsune - The 100 watt minimum is for good plant growth, you can use less for vegging, it just isn't as fast. Personally I would just start with a single 23w, and add as she gets bigger, you most likely won't need more than three, but since the light only travels a few inches it's better to have a few smaller ones spread out than one large on in the center. For what it's worth plants need little light just to live, I have a male plant in a spare room that only gets reflected light, he's been alive for 10 weeks, the last week we haven't even seen the sunlight, he's starting to sag but he's certainly not dying yet. I don't know anything about LED lights, so I can't make any suggestions, but I've seen people get results with them so it's also an option if you can find something that works for you. In my opinion LST'ing mothers is good for two reasons, first, it manages height, second it exposes the nodes and side branches to light sooner so they grow faster.
How long can you keep the mother plant alive? Is this something that I can keep alive for a couple generations or is this something that will die off no matter how much I love her? I was thinking of keeping her around for a long time, I was going to trim her down to keep her from getting too big on me and just giving her nutrients and everything. Or is this something that I can't do? Will she still bud up no matter if I keep her a good lighting schedule?
Greatkitsune - From my understanding you can keep the mother plant alive indefinitely, as long as she is taken care of. I doubt this extends into eternity, but for the foreseeable future at least. Cannabis flowers by a photoperiod, as long as the lights are on long enough to prevent the flowering cycle from starting then it will remain in vegetative state.
Awesome, maybe I can get a couple years out of her then. Grow 1 strain for a year or so off a nice feminized seed, LST and maintain her for a couple years. Or less if I want to switch to another strain for awhile. I guess what would be the minimum wattage to keep her alive for a couple years? Would the 100 watts be required, OR could I get her to survive well at say 50 watts since I am not overly concerned with her growth just her health? Trying to think to save power so I can focus my money on the main grow lights.
I don't mean to be rude, or dismissive, but all of the questions you are asking could be answered using the search function, or a regular search engine. I love to help, but by doing all the reading for you I'm only encouraging you to stay dependent on another person. Lead, don't follow. http://forum.grasscity.com/absolute-beginners/788571-how-many-watts-keep-mother-alive.html As long as the link worked, there was already a thread about this exact thing. It looks like 50w will suffice to keep her alive. One person claims to have kept a plant alive under a single 26w bulb, but with minimal growth. Again, I don't mean to be rude, but it's tons easier if you answer your own questions, plus the knowledge acquired along the way may one day be invaluable to you.