Q's on Large Scale Cloning

[Core]

hello IC

first of all i used the search button and i read most of the threads on large scale cloning....i found the EZ CLOner thread....the DIY perlite proprigator....and a few more.....but non come in the league i am talking about....and to be clear about this i'm not blowing anybody's horn here....i'm just in need of prelimenary info before i take on the job i've been offerd...
i am used to clone in dirt in smaller quanity's like 50 or so......

so what would it take for me to set up a room for mom's and 1500 clones every 8 weeks....and it has to be workable and QUICK !! ..filling small pots of soil is not a option how i see it.....do i think that right?

so how to go about??
i woz thinking rockwool cubes its the easys to clone in mass count ??with ebb and flow for less work....
coz i can be i can't visit them every day coz of security.....NWAY THIS IS ALL FICTION !!!....FOR NOW.....i just want some sane answsers and info and foremore thought on how to run a setup like this.....plz big boys help me out

....
critics can stay out.....plz
ohw yea i'm not realy asking about lightning and such...i know most of that stuff....just some idea's on how you would do it....

 

[AndreNicky]

This guy http://icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?p=2053174&highlight=clone#post2053174 uses Rockwool cubes on top of perlite, that way all u have to do is water the perlite on one side and the whole thing will wick watering all clones

 

[PharmaCan]

Up until your cuttings actually have roots, they will be intaking moisture through their leaves so you really don't have to keep the rooting medium anything other than moist which doesn't really require much watering. If you keep the medium too wet, the stems will rot. I like to use rapid rooters with a dome, but for larger scale you could use a big box instead of multiple domes. Maybe adapt an E&F system to water once or twice per week.

PC

 

[00420]

tray's tray's n more tray's...........
i never had the luck with rockwool as to oasis cube's...... and you can get the smaller cubes thats 104 per tray....

 

[BeeBee]

I agree with 420 on the clone production. Lots and lots of trays. Either rockwool or Oasis, minimum 50 clones per tray, that's at least 36 trays (at 20% loss). They don't need a lot of watering until the humidity dome comes off--and even then, every second or third day is fine, unless you use really bright lights or the area gets very hot (over 80 starts to be a problem).

The much greater difficulty is where to get the cloning material. Many times you can get material from the primary production area, by cutting off branches from the bottoms of the plants toward the end of the grow cycle. If you can get the bulk of your material like that (at the appropriate time), then supplementing with mothers would require fewer mothers, space, time, and expense.

When approaching clone production, I think it helps break it up in to two separate systems:

1. Producing the cloning material. The goal is to produce enough material, ready at the right time, with minimal effort and maximal success. This may require several different sources, either of the same cultivar or different ones. The harvest in this system is the pieces you need for..

2. Producing the clones. The goal is to take the material produced in step 1 and produce the target number of clones, ready to grow rapidly on the target date.

These are two entirely different production systems.

 

[Core]

thanks for all the input guys.....but the first link seems very intresting to me.....as for them trays...at first glance it don't seem to handy for this kind of opperation....but i'm not dismissing it

remember i still need to set up the room...so i can build or buy anything i want..... thats why i said the first link seems more intresting as the tray idea....

i just want to cut...dip and plant........Lava's setup comes close imo


maintaining MOM's won't be a problem in such.....they will be kept in the same room .i'm counting 3 to 5 plants in 5 gallon containers....is that counted right?

 

[BeeBee]

3 to 5 moms!--that means 300 to 500 cuttings per mom every eight weeks. Doesn't seem too likely.

Whether you use one large bed or smaller trays doesn't make too much difference. The large perlite bed in the picture had 480 to 600 clones on it--you'll need a much larger one--about 3 feet by 18 feet! I think three or four rolling wire racks from Costco and some 4 ft work lights from the Depot would be easier to set up and maintain, and just as effective.

 

[ZeusOGrefugee]

Hey brotha Core, may I recommend building urself some bubble cloners such as mine!!! all you need is a few strong air pumps, a bunch of tubing, glue gun, drill, airstones and neoprene inserts...prolly cost you a coouple hundred tops...PM me if u want more in depth info...Peace

p.s.-what you cookin up bro???LOL

- Z

 

[headiez247]

Ya, fuck making some DIY. If you need 1500 clones every 8 weeks your in the big leagues, buy something legit.

564 clones per. So grab 3 of these @ $1500 each and ur all set.

 

[PharmaCan]

maintaining MOM's won't be a problem in such.....they will be kept in the same room .i'm counting 3 to 5 plants in 5 gallon containers....is that counted right?

That's pretty optimistic. If you keep the mothers in 5 gal. coco under HPS lights you're probably looking at closer to 6-7. Depends on the strain, how big you grow them, how small you go with the cuttings that you clone. BTW "Green Light Rooting Hormone", available at Lowe's et al, is only $5/bottle and the stuff works really well.

PC

 

[smurfin'herb]

dont use aero cloners, dont use domes. For something like this, you just need to simply have a room that is a clone dome! Clone in straight up coco. I have for yrs, and works just as good as anything else and its the cheapest. Your gonna need a room that is consatntly around at least 80% humidity. Achieve this buy using an ultrasonic fogger tied to a humidity controller. If u used trays and domes on a scale like that, your success rates will go down due to the fact that they will not get much co2 in each individual tray on a daily basis (molds and mildews will form), just b/c theres so many and it would be a major pita to open each one every day!! So just make the room super humid and dont use domes! You may have to spray 1 time per day after the first few days, but this could easily be achieved by buying a micro mister system. Kind of like the ones you see at the grocery store to keep all the veggies nice and moist. Theres my 2 cents bud.

 

[BeeBee]

I second the suggestion that you need a dedicated clone-room. Mothers and clones require radically different environments in order to thrive.
Clones, especially when first cut and placed in media, require cool temperatures (about 69 degrees F) and high humidity, with low to moderate light levels. They don't like much air circulation (it dries them out). To grow mothers in the same room as clones pretty much requires that you use domes for the clones. But for 1500 clones--build a climate-controlled, dedicated clone-room.
The mothers will thrive in the same environment as the grow-room, but should perhaps be kept separate, because of pest issues.
Figuring at least 1800 pieces to get 1500 good starts (and this is optimistic), you'd need 9 mothers at 200 per. I think you're going to need 2 or 3 1000 or 4 600 watt lights, and 16 to 60 mothers, depending on the style of mother-room you build.

 

[dongle69]

I used to have a clone business that produced 700-800 clones every 2 weeks.
I used (4) 120 site EZ cloners. I doubled up cuttings in each insert.
I had 20 mothers, averaging over 40 cuts per plant.
Mothers were in Waterfarms.
Everything was in the same room with temps swinging from from a low of 60 to to a high of 85 degrees.
I was amazed how easy the setup was.
I hate taking cuttings, though!

 

[LiLWaynE]

great replies...

headiez, your post seems to be the answer to core's situation. 1500 clones is some serious shit, so a pre fab'd machine like that makes the most sense to me. Buy two of them for a total of 3g's, and double up like dongle does. 564 x 2 x 2= 2256 clones...oh, and aero cloning is quick... so, you'll have those clones with some nice roots in about 5-10 days....

Im a big big fan of the aero cloners.. its just so easy to cut clone, and stick in cloner. no need to prep with any mediums and you can easily check roots, and pull them out for transplanting whenever. My personal success rates with Aerocloning far exceeded all other attempts. Rockwool cubes work, but lotsa of them always die off for me. Coco IS cheap, but its a pain in the ass. Aer0 cloning only uses water.. its a clean clone job with high success rates.

TRY AERO!

 

[Core]

Awsome repley's !!!
thanks you all for contributing to this thread.......but in a few days i will know the dimentions of the room itself...and ofcourse the amount of $$ i'm getting to work with to build the room.
as for dedicating the room to soley the clones is not doable..... the mom's will need to be in there....ok maybe a bit seperate but it has to be inthere....
i will be giving it some serious thoughts and i'll talk it over with my new partner
Thanks again people !! some more thoughs are always welcome ^^

 

[smurfin'herb]

Personally i can fill a 72 site clone tray full of coco in about....15-20 seconds. And i can for sure plant the cuttings twice as fast into that vs. if i was using my aero cloner. I take 5-7 cuttings at a time, and then dip them in some hormone simultneously. Then i just stick them into the coco. When i do my indiana bubblegum, i dont even have to trim the leaves because they are so small, and i can knock out a tray in about 20 min. If i am cloning a fat indica, it may take upwards of 45min due to the extra work they require from trimming foliage back.
I own a 120 site ez-cloner, and its nice because of the low maintience, but pulling those pucks out, inserting clone, and the replacing puck takes more time and effort than simply sticking a cutting into some media imo. If u arent gonna be able to tend ur grow every day, and u cant make a devoted clone room, then i really do suggest aero-cloners. You dont need a dome, and u can literally "set it and forget it" w/ no need for rez changeouts for a solid 2wks. I have planted cuts into that thing in an enviroment that was 20-30% humidity and i still got a 90% success rate in 14 days. I literally dont even check on the cuts for the first 7-10, cuz i just know they are gravy! But what i have found with the ez-cloner, is that the ph like to rise like crazy! Im guessing cuz of the high levels of O2. Ph doesnt really matter until the plants get stubs/small roots on them, so thats when i adjust it. I could just be me tho, i use r/o with 1/2tsp/gal calmag+
and i add some hesi root complex around day 7-10.
Another prob with ez-cloners is the water temp issue. You always hear about ppl throwing frozen 2 liters in them! I personally just run the pump on a timer to defeat this issue, but i have recently been thinking about just putting a one size smaller pump in there and see what that does, and if it works.. anyone heard of ppl doin this?

 

[ft100]

build your own ez cloner and diy. not hard to do at all, would save so much money it is ridiculous. shit if you want to hire me to make the machines for you im down. point is, you can make this happen for very little money compared to 3000 dollars. if your interested hit me up, i can at least break the numbers down for you in terms of dollars saved. peace smoke good luck

 

[PharmaCan]

One consideration is what you are going to do with the clones. If they are rooted in an aerorooter or ez-cloner, won't they have to be planted in something before they can be transported? A tray, whether it has rapid rooters or coco, is easily transportable; clones from a machine are not. Instead of a bunch of hoods, you could build/buy a cabinet or two and control the environment in the cabs just as well as you could with a hood.

PC

 

[LiLWaynE]

One consideration is what you are going to do with the clones. If they are rooted in an aerorooter or ez-cloner, won't they have to be planted in something before they can be transported? A tray, whether it has rapid rooters or coco, is easily transportable; clones from a machine are not. Instead of a bunch of hoods, you could build/buy a cabinet or two and control the environment in the cabs just as well as you could with a hood.

PC

Core- dedicating any room solely to clones def. should be doable, especially in this situation you are about to be in... you dont need anything in the room other then the clone machines and some shop lights, and perhaps SOME air circulation. Seems like the biggest issue with cloning this way is the large chunk of change required upfront for the cloners... 16 of those 1500 clones should very easily produce enough money to re-pay for this aspect of your OP. I would look at the machines as a total ASSET. you can produce 5k+ clones in less then a month with those machines and a little bit of motivation to do ALOT of monotonious work....

Smurf, COCO is a great method, I just dont like the fact that you have to pop them out of the little tray to check if there are roots. With aero's, you can always just pluck a puck out, or if you have a DIY cloner, you just lift up the whole lid and see which have rooted, and which havent. The only time I really have to pull pucks out is when im ready to transplant. When I first cut, i just stick them in the pucks that are already in place. easy as 1-2-3. As far as the 120 site ez-cloner is concerned, yes i have heard of people having problems with them overheating, and i believe most of them fix that with putting them on a 15 on, 15 off timer. The 15 minutes the pump is off should allow for the rez to cool off. I am also a firm believer that the 15on/off bit allows the roots to grow more rapidly, in search of water during the 15 minutes theyre not being sprayed. All in all though, I must fall back on the old addage: "to each, his own"


ft100, i hate building aerocloners. its monotonious work. not only do you have to cut out all of the holes, but you have to cut out all of the pucks. then once you cut all of those, you have to cut all the clones... its just alot of work to do. In cores situation of dealing with 1500 clones (which would be what? 6k+ things he would have to cut?), i think it would be easier to take a rubberbanded wad of bills to the nearest hydroshop and trade them for the product.... or, he could enter 16 numbers, a name and an address on a e-growshop and have the system sent to a location of his choice...

Pharma, transporting clones straight outta the aerocloner is easier then transporting clones any other way if you ask me...

I pull the clones out of the machine when they have 6-7 inch roots dangling. Then i bunch all of the clones together. If only transporting small amounts of clones (most ive transported is 30) and I just get a baggy, fill it up with some water, stick the roots from the clones in it, and then with a piece of tape, i just wrap the top of the baggy around the stems and create somewhat of a way to keep everything together...very similar to how a bouquet of flowers would be bunched together...

when you get them to where they gotta go, they can be put into any medium. Ive transplanted into coco and hydroton with great results.

peace to all,

LW

 

[smurfin'herb]

weezy, i dont need to check for roots when i clone in coco, i just know that in 14 days they will be good to go. Same with the aero-cloner. What are u checking the roots for? Just to see how they progress or somethin...?

Transportation of aero-cuttings may at first seem to be hard, but waynes method is pretty reliable.

Also, if you do choose to do the coco method, make sure u or your client buys some burlap and rubber bands in case your client grows in nft or dwc ect.. If you dont do this, loose coco will be a problem. So u must either encase them in burlap or whatever is clever, or just clone in rapid rooters for the ppl that grow that way.