If you think cloning is easy and doesn't take any effort at all, and you can't understand why anyone would have any problems. Congratulations, I envy you. This thread is not for you. Please move on.
I know exactly how you feel. Cloning can be one of the most aggravating parts of gardening. For so many people they have such an easy time with cloning. I have read stories over and over about how some people just take a pair of rusty scissors, make a cut, and just stick a cutting in some random medium. Then have roots in a few days. While I am so happy for them, it drives me crazy!
If you are like me and have researched just about every forum, forum thread, article, etc to learn the secret combination that could solve my cloning problem, you will notice some very interesting patterns.
One of those in particular is that there are many people who have been cloning successfully for years and years, and then they move to a new location and can't clone for the life of them.
I have heard many people attribute this to some "mystery of cloning", dumb luck, bad luck, etc. This has never sat well with me because in theory, if all elements are the same, the result should be the same. Which lead me to the belief that there must be a missing link in cloning that is not obvious, and is causing SOME people to fail miserably, and or just take a very long time to get clones to root.
Not by a discovery of my own, but some random thread I found recently, I believe (for some of us, this is not inclusive) that link may have been found. WATER
I know the idea of quality water is not new to cloning. Just about every manual, article, forum post, etc talks about it. Though there is a particular aspect that I have not seen discussed until recently. CHLORINE levels in the WATER. Or calcium hypochlorite/soduim hypochlorite.
Interesting enough, this really isn't a new discovery. Cities, Agricultural Industries, and other businesses have been using CHLORINE for over 200 years as a safe way to sterilize water. So in fact, the very water that you have coming out of your faucet, may contain a low level of CHLORINE. At low levels it is considered safe and used on a very large scale. Even biologists and the agricultural industry believe that plants actually require chlorine (low levels) as a key element and helps them thrive.
So, getting to the point finally, we all live in different places. Each one with different water sources. Some on city water (with varying water treatment techniques) and others with well water. I would safely bet that the mass majority of us are using city water and that city water contains chlorine. Personally, I have well water and not city water.
So recently I experimented with adding calcium hypochlorite (shock chlorine) to my well water for my clones. I also ran clones without any chlorine added. Everything else being the same. Guess what. I got roots in 6 days with the chlorinated clones. It was an ah ha! moment!
So the thread that I read that lead me to this point was written by this person who tried a relatively new product on the market made by EZ-Clone called "Clear-Res". Clear-RES is used by adding 5ml (of clear-res) per gallon of water and re-added every 3 days in the same amount. This product is relatively new, but if you search around you will find that the people who use it have pure success. So anyway, this person checked out the ingredients of Clear-Res and discovered that it was simply Chlorine water in a bottle. 16oz of chlorine water for $20. Two and two together, an experiment was done to discover how much pool chlorine would be needed to reproduce the same strength found in Clear-Res. Using a non-ph buffered pool shock (or pure calcium-hypoclorite) that you can commonly find at most hardware stores and walmart, the formula was discovered.
Here it is:
So for roughly $4 you can buy this pool shock that will make you roughly 454 gallons of Clear-Res!
$4 for 454 gallons, using this.
Or $20 for 16oz, using this
So if you are one of those people like me who has struggled with cloning and has tried everything, I suggest trying this. If you think about it, it makes so much sense. Could it be that many of those lucky bastards out there who never have an issue cloning, also have CHLORINE in their water? I think so.
If you are a Aerocloner guy, this water treatment has other benefits too. If you just use tap water with the chlorine added and nothing else, your Aerocloner will stay sparkling clean forever. Really should be nothing to clean between rounds (though I recommend to always clean thoroughly anyways, but the job will be so easy now). Also, with adding chlorine, you can now ditch that water chiller and all the other things you probably do to reduce temperatures of your aerocloner. In fact, when using chlorine, I bet that the higher the temperature the faster you will get roots. With no risk of getting slime/bacteria.
Here is the steps for what I believe is a sure fire method:
Good luck and if you try this please post back to this thread. This is very much a work in progress and we can work together to refine it.
P.S. If you are using an aerocloner, make sure you clean your aerocloner very very well between uses. Never let your cloner get dirty. Never let water just sit in it. After cleaning it, and if its not going into immediate re-use, dry it completely. Inside the manifold and pump especially.
I know exactly how you feel. Cloning can be one of the most aggravating parts of gardening. For so many people they have such an easy time with cloning. I have read stories over and over about how some people just take a pair of rusty scissors, make a cut, and just stick a cutting in some random medium. Then have roots in a few days. While I am so happy for them, it drives me crazy!
If you are like me and have researched just about every forum, forum thread, article, etc to learn the secret combination that could solve my cloning problem, you will notice some very interesting patterns.
One of those in particular is that there are many people who have been cloning successfully for years and years, and then they move to a new location and can't clone for the life of them.
I have heard many people attribute this to some "mystery of cloning", dumb luck, bad luck, etc. This has never sat well with me because in theory, if all elements are the same, the result should be the same. Which lead me to the belief that there must be a missing link in cloning that is not obvious, and is causing SOME people to fail miserably, and or just take a very long time to get clones to root.
Not by a discovery of my own, but some random thread I found recently, I believe (for some of us, this is not inclusive) that link may have been found. WATER
I know the idea of quality water is not new to cloning. Just about every manual, article, forum post, etc talks about it. Though there is a particular aspect that I have not seen discussed until recently. CHLORINE levels in the WATER. Or calcium hypochlorite/soduim hypochlorite.
Interesting enough, this really isn't a new discovery. Cities, Agricultural Industries, and other businesses have been using CHLORINE for over 200 years as a safe way to sterilize water. So in fact, the very water that you have coming out of your faucet, may contain a low level of CHLORINE. At low levels it is considered safe and used on a very large scale. Even biologists and the agricultural industry believe that plants actually require chlorine (low levels) as a key element and helps them thrive.
So, getting to the point finally, we all live in different places. Each one with different water sources. Some on city water (with varying water treatment techniques) and others with well water. I would safely bet that the mass majority of us are using city water and that city water contains chlorine. Personally, I have well water and not city water.
So recently I experimented with adding calcium hypochlorite (shock chlorine) to my well water for my clones. I also ran clones without any chlorine added. Everything else being the same. Guess what. I got roots in 6 days with the chlorinated clones. It was an ah ha! moment!
So the thread that I read that lead me to this point was written by this person who tried a relatively new product on the market made by EZ-Clone called "Clear-Res". Clear-RES is used by adding 5ml (of clear-res) per gallon of water and re-added every 3 days in the same amount. This product is relatively new, but if you search around you will find that the people who use it have pure success. So anyway, this person checked out the ingredients of Clear-Res and discovered that it was simply Chlorine water in a bottle. 16oz of chlorine water for $20. Two and two together, an experiment was done to discover how much pool chlorine would be needed to reproduce the same strength found in Clear-Res. Using a non-ph buffered pool shock (or pure calcium-hypoclorite) that you can commonly find at most hardware stores and walmart, the formula was discovered.
Here it is:
- Basically, this pool shock comes in powered form.
- 1 gram of this powdered chlorine should be mixed into 1 gallon of water, to make what is almost an exact replacement for a bottle of Clear-Res.
- Then, once you have this bottle of chlorine water, you would use 1 liquid oz per 5 gallons of water. Repeat every 3 days.
So for roughly $4 you can buy this pool shock that will make you roughly 454 gallons of Clear-Res!
$4 for 454 gallons, using this.
Or $20 for 16oz, using this
So if you are one of those people like me who has struggled with cloning and has tried everything, I suggest trying this. If you think about it, it makes so much sense. Could it be that many of those lucky bastards out there who never have an issue cloning, also have CHLORINE in their water? I think so.
If you are a Aerocloner guy, this water treatment has other benefits too. If you just use tap water with the chlorine added and nothing else, your Aerocloner will stay sparkling clean forever. Really should be nothing to clean between rounds (though I recommend to always clean thoroughly anyways, but the job will be so easy now). Also, with adding chlorine, you can now ditch that water chiller and all the other things you probably do to reduce temperatures of your aerocloner. In fact, when using chlorine, I bet that the higher the temperature the faster you will get roots. With no risk of getting slime/bacteria.
Here is the steps for what I believe is a sure fire method:
- Clean environment. Keep your garden area VERY clean.
- Sterile tools. I always sterilize my tools and working surface for cloning with alcohol.
- Wash your hands and buy gloves. Always wash your hands thoroughly and buy a box of those gloves used by doctors etc. Cheap. I use them every single time I enter my garden, for any reason.
- Healthy mothers. If your mothers look like hell, cloning is probably not going to go well.
- Use tap water. Distilled and RO don't work as well in my experience and slow down or prevent roots.
- PH your water to 6.3 and keep it there. I still don't know if this step is required, but when you have had as many problems as I have, you don't mess around and do what is considered a standard.
- Use a brand new razor. I buy a 100 pack of razors at the hardware store for like $5. They are cheap. A nice and sharp razor helps prevent crushing the stem when making your cuts.
- As soon as you cut the clone off the mother, put it in a cup of water for at least 5 minutes.
- If you use rooting hormone, never dip the clone in the bottle. If you have done this in the past, throw away that bottle. This simply contaminates the whole bottle. Don't use too much hormone. Simply coat anywhere a cut was made (end and nodes).
- Use the chlorine water formula described above. If using a medium, your medium should be moist and not wet. Really, they don't need much water because you will keep the humidity very high the first 7 days. If using an aerocloner, simply put your tap water into your reservoir and add the chlorine solution in as described above. Re-add the chlorine solution every 3 days.
- If aerocloner, humidity shouldn't be a problem. If using a medium, humidity is critical. For the first 48 hours I would seal up your clones in a dome and never open it. You want over 90% RH. After the 2nd day, open the dome for 10 minutes each day. Each day after add 10 minutes (day 3=20 mins, day 4=30 mins, etc).
- Keep temperatures in the low 80's. You don't HAVE todo this, but it will speed up the cloning. In low temps it could take weeks, where if you were in the low 80's it could take days. Don't forget, the chlorine is going to keep the nastiness from growing.
- Take larger clones, but only leave 1-2 sets up top. I also don't cut the leaves in half. I have heard this slows things down, but I am not sure. Still need further testing.
- Don't spray anything on the plants. To keep humidity up, spray the dome. Also, I have been putting a little pool of water in the tray (with the chlorine added). This helps keep temps stable and keeps the humidity high.
- Use VERY low light. This is really important. The plants need to root and not grow sets. A single 27w (2 foot) T5 located about 16inches above your clones is perfect. If you must use stronger light, put a paper towel on top of your humidity dome. Really, they don't need much light.
- No nutes, no additives, no snake oil. Just water and chlorine that is PH'ed. If things work out right, you will have roots in 6-10 days. Does it need to go faster than that?
Good luck and if you try this please post back to this thread. This is very much a work in progress and we can work together to refine it.
P.S. If you are using an aerocloner, make sure you clean your aerocloner very very well between uses. Never let your cloner get dirty. Never let water just sit in it. After cleaning it, and if its not going into immediate re-use, dry it completely. Inside the manifold and pump especially.
