This years outdoor clone program.

Im a seed grower first, but cloning is an important part of my outdoor growing activities. Always looking for ideas, Im interested in how others incorporate cloning into their outdoor grows.

I will usually have 2 mother plants march and these 2 plants are my official "cloners". This year i have a sensi star mom and a selected sour bubble mom ready. I willl take the first small batch and they will be planted at the end of april along with my seed crop. Clones will continue to be cut from the two parent plants all the way up until i find a seed plant growing in the fiield that shows exceptional qualities, and then i set in on her, cutting her to pieces and spreading her about.

The second use of clones will be a forced flowered grow. Ill take these cuttings around the middle of june and then start moving them in and out for 13 hrs of light, starting and then by early July they are several weeks into flower. Sincne after June 22 the days start getting shorter, they wont try and revert. This practice will alow me to harvest by early sept. This year I will be growing Gforce this way because it takes 12 weeks to finish and I couldnt grow the plant any other way.

The last clones i take in the year come in early sept. and are the lower most branches of the best specimen of the season. I keep these lower branches in water for 2 months and then slow root them for 4 weeks. These clones are my first indoor grow for winter usally started around DEc. 1

How do clones fit into your growing model?

First of all let me say thanks Silverback. I have been picking yer brain via the search function for some time now. Since we are geographically neighbors, your info is particularly useful to me, especially your timelines for various processes, you comments on outdoor strains, and so much more. I will be watching for more of the great info you provide. I am bringing along 2 strains right now via cloning for the outdoor season. I am sure I will learn a lot more from folks here.

I've not used clones in years.

I dont like keeping plants around indoors, and grow from seed every year, doing controlled breeding of select plants to better acclimate them to my location.

since i'm starting basically from scratch with new strains this year..

i'll start all seed as usual, start seeds early May, grow to about 12", trasnplant outside about June 1st after a short hardening off and let veg till july.
By July I can take 2 clones of EACH plant, these are rooted and kept till after harvest/maturation of the main crop. the main crop will be selected through and seeded as usual on a controlled basis.

All clones are marked so I know which parent plant they belong to.

After the outdoor season is over I sit down and grade each female from smoke,production, and growth tendencies.
Males are selected from maturation and growth.
3 parents of each sex are chosen, those clones are saved, all others are killed and disposed of(did I mention I dont like plants in the house?)

These clones will form basis for breeding next year, along with seeds of the crosses made.
Each male and female clone is grown out and crossed to each other, making new seeds of some of the current plants growing that were made from crosses last year,proceed to harvest, keeping track of all seeds and plants again.

Now here's where I drop the ball, I dont take clones anymore past this point,(once again I dont like keeping plants around)though if I really was serious about breeding heres where keeping males around would be a good idea.

At this point I have smoke to test again AND seeds made of those exact crosses, I sort out seed from the best 3-5 crosses and thats my new breeding stock.the unknown second generation seeds are kept in storage for later use/backup.

From this point I grow from known select seed and notes of the original parents.

2 seasons to pick the best plants and do some progeny testing, I go Mendel after that.

hope this makes sense.

I plan on doing the majority of my outdoor grows from seed, but I will be having some prized varieties going outside from clone; SAGE, Maple Leaf Indica, SSH, Orient Express, and Romulan.

My clones will be going out in early to mid-may(depending on variety). I like putting them out with a rootball of at least 1 gallon. This way they hit the ground running so to speak.

The hardest part of putting clones out that you have had for a while is to try and match the light cycle of your mother/clones so that they don't start flowering when they do go outside.

I will certainly be breeding, but primarily with my seed plants, attempting to develop an acclimatized variety for my area.

I will also be taking clones from selected seed plants in the field for breeding/propagation.

Curious as to whether anyone has tried air-layering in an attempt to clone out in the field?

Scaramanga,

I've considered air layering, but I think you need o feep the medium on the branch consistently wet, and thats more suited to backyard grows, not guerilla. seems the best way to take clones in my mind,since they are kept alive by mother plant the whole time.
there was a good thread here for awhile about this, dont remember what section.

how does the orient express do outside? what lat.?

Guess ill jus let ya know what im up too

From Seed

January 1st germd 125 seeds
January 4th planted seeds
January 6th seeds above soil
February 1st Flipped seeds to 12/12
February 15th Killed 53 Males/ Select best plants (37) n 35 ended up being thrown out
February 21st Revertd back to Veg

This is a on going process but these plants will be vegged and used for clones and then placed outdoors on May 10th (my possible OKOPs - One Kilo One Plant)

From Mothers to Clones

March 1st Take clones off established mother plants
March 8th Clones rooted n ready for trasnplant
Now ima veg the new clones to turn into mothers also so by April 1st I should have 15 to 25 new moms to hack away and for the next month or two ill clone n root, clone n root

so silverback, wehn you cut your clones from outdoor, what medium do you use to transport them to wherever you let them root?

SatoriSOG said:

so silverback, wehn you cut your clones from outdoor, what medium do you use to transport them to wherever you let them root?

Click to expand...

i'm not speaking for SB, but...

a bottle/jar/bucket of water works fine. just get them in the water as soon as you can to prevent air from getting in the stem, trim end off clean when you coat with rooting hormone and transplant.

yeah satori,
I use ziplock bags. When I get to the plants, I take out the ziplock- fill it with about 1/4" of water. Throw my cuts in the bag, I then inflate the ziplocks with my breath and throw them in my pack. The ziplock "balloons" protect the cuts from bumping around- a lot of times I will have several "balloon" baggies with different mother's cuts. I have done this in the middle of summer (85-90 F) and had them in the pack for three hours or so- the cuts survived just fine. peace
mycall

Hey SatoriSog, in the field I personally like to use the small water bottles; not the short ones. Leave about a third of the water in the bottle throw your cut/s in there and throw the cap on and label. Makes for a very durable and effective transport vessel.

HI North, I agree that keeping the rooting medium moist would be the biggest challenge in a guerilla grow. But give me some time I'm working on it.

I'm at 35N. This will be my first year doing the Orient Express outside. I'll keep you posted though. There is a thread over in the ACE seeds forum, with some outdoor pics by ker2noir that look really good. I also found some outdoor pictures by Alaskind, and Raco and in each case they were large plants, so I'm excited.

Scara,

perhaps water crystals? mixed in with peat. finding the right amount, that wont rot things would be to trick.

North, I was thinking of using water crystals as well as perhaps wrapping it in some kind of semipermeable wrap, perhaps tyvek. I have seen plain plastic wrap used with no ill effects, and it kept the rooting mass damp until roots formed. I can get roots within 7-10 days so its not outside the realm of possibility. Even if I had to visit once to rehydrate the rooting mass it would be worth it. Especially given the number of cuts that you could take out in the field from a good sized plant this could prove very advantageous.

Good suggestion, Thanks.

Hey everyone.

I use the 44 oz big gulp plastic cup with the clear/opague plastic lid from your local convienience store fountainSatoriSOg. I dont poke the straw hole out and if im gonna have to travel cross country, I take a thin piece of duct tape for the lid. The lids actually stay on well when snapped. Ive left them in the cup for several days before taking them out.

I always start just a few plants a little early so they can get enough size to start cutting on. This year im doing Sensi star because I dont want the sativa pheno, I want the indica pheno. I m cloning Sour Bubble 3 because the plants are a little wierd and Ive had to pick one that is healthy and matches bogs' description of the "one".
Im cloning the Black Domina because Ive had the seeds since 2002 and i only got 4 plants from 15 seeds. One female was nice and she's the momma.

As soon as the plants are 16-20", I start cutting and rooting all the way until the last batch which goes out the first of august

Hey Silverback,, how was the Black Domina? I just came across some and i'm a lil excited.

Hey Silverback. You are an outdoor reference for me, man, I'll have to tag along. I would love to mother same genetics as you bro, but I'm focusing on low maintenance early finishers for this season.

I plan on cloning some super photo sensitive strains to put outdoors, but I am not sure of how suitable they will be for cloning as some may have autoflower tendencies. I will let you know how it turns out. Here's my lineup:

Guerilla Gold (Greens)
Manitoba Medicine (Greens)
GG x C99 (Smoke a Lot)
Burnese x F.I. (Jordan of the Islands)
Ambrosia (Jordan of the Islands)
Northern Lights (Peak Seeds)

I chose the NL based on your grow report in outdoor strainguide thread. Ever try cloning it and/or any other of these strains? I probably won't mother all strains I have. Right now, I'm leaning more towards making mothers out of NL, Ambrosia and GGxC99. Getting ready to sprout mother seeds any day now, so I would be most grateful for any advice you can provide.

Blaze one,
Earl

thanks for the compliments early4sure.

The Peaks Nl is great. Potent, finishes early as hell and has a very good yield. I like the purpler pheno better because it has better mould resistance. Watch her the last couple of weeks if it turns wet. Pick it. Ive picked the strain after 6 weeks and gotten damn good weed. Less of it but good.

Sweet, I will make sure to cherish the NL accordingly.
Now, let's get growing