How to Choose Mother Plants For Marijuana Cloning

Once you get to know the basics of marijuana cultivation, your next step is getting mother plants to begin the cloning effort. There are three primary reasons for doing so. Firstly, the economy of getting mother plants is essentials since to buy quality marijuana seeds mean that you may have to spend more than you bargained for. Unless you do your cultivation to produce seeds, you should avoid putting out so much money to buy new seeds each time you begin the marijuana grow process.

Secondly, when you use clones, it will speed up your marijuana grow efforts. With clones, you will avoid the necessity for seed germination and you also have to think about the period of time, it takes to wait for the process to be completed. Thirdly, cloning your mother plants means that you have to consider quality first and foremost. When you are able to find an excellent phenotype with the desirable qualities, it is only sensible to repeat the cloning process of your mother plants so as to genetically produce an identical offspring.

The Setback

One setback with the process, though, is that you cannot decipher the quality of your seeds until it has been flowered. By that time, it will be too late to transform the seeds into mother plants without reverting back to the vegetative phase and this can cause the plants to be stressed. What do you do in this situation?

Selecting Mother Plants For Marijuana Cloning

Let's say you get a new batch of cannabis seeds. Once you start cultivating them and you notice that they are growing in the way you want them, start by taking the cuttings from individual cannabis plants. When will you do this? It will usually occur during a month of the vegetative growth. Take those cuttings prior to the pre-flowering phase. Similar to their donors, clones possess identical biological age. Therefore, when you take the cuttings from the flowering cannabis plant, it will still flower, whether they are just a few inches in length or not. Taking the clones from the mother plants during the vegetative phase allows the grower to have more control over the results.

The Cuttings

Now, label all the cuttings that you made so that it corresponds with each of the donor mother plants. You could keep your cuttings in one room as you would the donors and do so under 18 hours of lighting. Once your marijuana clones have been established, you can then separate them from your donor plants. Start to flower your donor plants by adjusting the lighting, making it 12 hours lighting and 12 hours without lighting. Keep your cuttings on a light cycle while in a vegetative state. Once you see the male plants appear, these should be immediately removed along with the corresponding clones. You won't have any use for these.

The Flowering Phase

If your cannabis strain has a lengthy flowering period, then your marijuana clones might turn out to be too large and unmanageable and they will forcefully try to get into the flowering phase. If you find this happening, just take your clones from those clones and continue in the vegetative phase for the second generation of clones. As the donor plants develop during the flowering stage, you will be able to choose which ones interest you and which ones you prefer and which ones have the qualities that you like.  The most important categories to consider are vigor, aroma, taste, yield, appearance, phenotypes, and potency. Reject the clones prior to the flowering phase.

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