Whens The Earliest You Can Guess Which Plant Youll Want To Be The Mother?

Generally speaking, when taking clones i typically pick branches that look like theyd make good mothers, ie, characteristics i value.

I let plants get large enough and trained enough that i have good choices. Those with limited space might find this to be an issue, however, a plant senses its root boundaries, as coot once mentioned to me, it senses for its pot, which feeds the theory that whatever size they are confined to they will mature in. However, plants left longer than maturity or full flowering period deform and seem to mutate. Its unhealthy, and limbs stretch. Ive kept mother clones for nearly a year in tiny foam cups, like a medium soda sized cup from a fountain drink. Some of the plants are 3 and a half feet tall, extremely lanky, ph imbalanced, stressed to the max, with minimal light.

The purpose is to stress these mothers to see which doesnt hermie. So far, none have, which means that femeinized theres a good chance that these will NEVER produce male flowers, making them "perfect" fem plants, from a breeders perspective. This too is theory passed on here in these boards and others, which is why i attach a disclaimer to them.

But back to your question, as soon as a plant roots it takes on its adult characteristics (leaf structure, smell, internode stretch, etc) this is my observation.

Once the small clone is deemed "healthy" (no bottom growth loss, new top growth that is vigorous) that is when i choose the best and the others are given away.

~ poke

 

Take the strongest/fastest growing clone and use that one for the mom.  Clones are a replica of the plant they came from, so we want to make sure the mom is vigorous.