Cloning Gel Question

[Red-Cricket]

Hello All, Iv heard one should NOT dip differnt cuttings out of the same container. I pour out a small amount of Clonex into a small mini-test tube with a lid and dip my cuttings into this, not the jar. Can one use this method for good results? Iv cut 12 cuttings and soak them in this mini-test tube for about 3 min and then into rockwool. Some say YES you can reuse gel and others say no...im lost....Thanks for your help

 

[TorturedSoul]

The issue is one of potential contamination of the cloning gel. IOW, if one cutting has a plant disease and you dip it straight into the original container (a rather hospitable environment), you've probably created a plant disease factory, lol.

Assuming that ALL of your cuttings are healthy and disease/microbe free, this is not an issue. But since a plant can be infected before there are any visible symptoms - and since many people purchase or trade plants, or move plants inside & out - it's usually a good practice to squeeze the amount that you expect to use in one sitting into a temporary container.

 

[Red-Cricket]

Thanks TS your advise is taken, would you use a seperate portion for EACH cutting? For EACH plant? Thanks Again!

 

[TorturedSoul]

I'll take an index card (sturdier than regular paper) and tear a small corner off of it & roll it into a thin cone or even just place a dollop (scientific measurement, lmao) onto the card. I use Olivia's Gel, BtW. I get the amount that I think I'll use for each set of cuttings and then dispose of whatever remains afterwards. If I am just doing my own plants, I'll do all of them at once off of the same card. I have never encountered cross-contamination problems between cuttings - nor have I noticed any if I placed several (even from different plants out of the same grow) into one tray of perlite/vermiculite mixture and watered with Olivia's Cloning Solution until they rooted. But if I'm doing cuttings of a plant or plants that I've recently gotten from a friend or if I'm taking a cutting from a plant in a friend's grow then I will use a separate bit for each different plant just in case.

Err... That's when I actually use the stuff, lol. Sometimes I don't bother with cloning aids. Seems like a healthy well-fed mother-plant gives cuttings that can root without help in a good environment - especially a plant like cannabis where if a branch is heavy enough to touch the ground and you cover that part with soil it'll grow roots and you then have two plants after cutting them apart. The various aids (gels/powders/solutions & hardware) just seem to increase the likelihood of success slightly (or substantially if the environment isn't that great to begin with) and speed the process. I realized that cannabis cuttings were pretty tough after finding a forgotten cutting between the couch and the end table the next day <OOPS> and managing to root it. And I realized that constant misting and humidity domes to create a "dripping" environment weren't a necessity one day after another <OOPS>: I took a half-dozen cuts from a plant, the telephone rang, and I stuck them in the refrigerator. I ended up having to leave to deal with an emergency. I remembered the cuttings the next day, opened the refrigerator... And pulled out a wilted mess, lol. I was going to toss them but instead decided to cut the ends off at an angle and stick them into a jar of water, thinking that I'd come back "in a minute" and take the best one out of the miserable bunch & see if it'd root. So three or four hours later (lol) I wandered back into the kitchen and they had stood up! Only way that could happen was if the bare-end cuttings had managed to draw water into and up through their stems.

Some strains are harder to root than others, of course. But most of them will do so without a lot of effort.

Sorry. Rambling.

 

[Red-Cricket]

G Day T Soul, I found my cuttings were WAY to wet. After 2 wks they were rotted at the surface with jiffy cubes. So I tried your way using ocean forest soil (OK?) and watering very lightly around the edge with a turkey baster 3" plastic dixie cup, after planting. How wet do you start them and keep them?? Growing northern lights, Big Bud and Bubble Gum. Using humidity dome misting 1-2 times a day, used clonex and no nutes until more leafs. Any suggeastions?? Hat off to ya Soul..your professional advice is some of the BEST! Thanks Again! Red

 

[TorturedSoul]

I am NOT a professional!

"Wetness" depends, IMO, on oxygenation. IOW, a stagnant situation is more likely to promote rot than a more damp but also more oxygenated one.

I'm not a big fan of misting. Especially not in combination with a humidity dome. Might mist if the ambient RH is quite low, but under a dome that is a non-issue. Besides, the whole point is for the cuttings to grow roots. A healthy cutting should have enough stored energy to do so (or at least make a pretty good start at it) if treated right and if the person understands that the majority of the cutting's efforts will be to do so and not, say, grow and branch. Not to mention, anyone who cares to take ten wilted bare cuttings, stick them into a very mild oxygenated solution (or even glass of water) or suitably prepared medium, and watch seven or more of them "unwilt" and stand back up within a couple of hours can see that cuttings can and will uptake liquid through a bare stem.

If you don't live in an ultra-low humidity environment, consider: Take a few cuts and throw them into the refrigerator. Prepare 12-ounce cups of perlite:vermiculite. Water it well with a very mild basic nutrient solution (if using 1/3 each of perlite, vermiculite, and FFOF... then just use water). Let it set a few minutes to make sure that there are no dry pockets, then poke a few holes into the bottoms of the cups. Take cuttings out of your refrigerator. Look like wilted lettuce, lol? Use a toothpick or something slightly larger to make holes in the medium and place a cutting into each cup. Don't mist, don't place under a humidity dome. Pick up each cup and get a feel for the weight. Do the same with a cup which you haven't watered in order to notice the difference. Instead of misting twice a day and locking them into a 100% RH container, place them where they can get mild light, fresh air movement (no direct fans, lol), and warmth. When the cups are obviously lighter - but not as light as the bone-dry one you felt for comparison - then water. The vermiculite in the mixture ought to "wick and hold" whatever amount of moisture in the containers so that the moisture-level is even throughout the cup (IOW, even if it is somewhat lower than optimum, there should be no dry areas).

Olivia's Cloning (nutrient) Solution works. So does a very mild (1ml/gallon of each component) General Hydroponics Three-Part Flora solution. So NO nutrients is probably unnecessary - but, again, a good cutting should have enough stored energy to root given nothing but oxygenated water and mild light. They might even root in the dark, IDK. If I can find my last (oh, I hope that there IS a "last" one remaining, lol) graduated pipette I'll try in the next month or two to see what a good strength of Blue Planet Nutrients Two-Part BlueMax is for rooting cuttings.

Keeping to the "mild," FFOF may not be to strong/hot - but it's certainly not required. A 50:50 mix of perlite:vermiculite will certainly hold the moisture, as will a 3333(sic) mix of perlite:vermiculite:"harmless non-nutritive soil" or perlite:vermiculiteeat moss.

If a container is large enough (as in "the great outdoors"), cannabis plants will "self-root" when a branch gets buried somewhere along it; it'll eventually grow roots there and can be safely cut from the mother.

It's really not rocket science, lol. If the process of rooting a cutting seems to be difficult, just ask your grandmother how she does it (or how her grandmother did, or her grandmother, or...).