Thanks
dindy, and I can run down the basics of it pretty easy---as that's the whole idea.... I cant/dont take credit for this method by any means and I am sure there are diy's here at RIU explaining this cloner as well. My guy at the hydro shop here threw mine together in about five minutes a few years ago for me and charged me $50 and a 10 gal RubberMaid tote. The only items I bought from him were the Titainium heater and neoprene collars, and I guess the delux air pump too. I see that now these heaters are like $35?, and the air pump $15? But you dont necessarily need this specific heater as any aquarium heater should work. The neoprene collars are $15 for 50.......and you dont even
need these: shit, you can use a fricken 'pool noodle' and slice it up into hundreds of collars for a couple bucks, or even the bottom of Styrofoam cups-----for that matter you could literally drill holes in the lid of your container and just drop your cuts in the holes(but you'd have to yank them out the second you see roots popping so you dont damage them taking them out of the hole....).
Totally assuming you understand how to take cuttings, being steril, etc....
The stem goes straight in the water, and yes it stays there. If you didn't have the air bubbling on the stems they would rot, yes. This is why I prefer getting the long air
stones(thinking about 12") and hooking them to a dual-outlet pump(not split-line) and setting in the bottom running length-wise(pre-soak the stones for 12hrs if you can). My tote is 10gal. This creates plenty of bubble roll and and keeps o2 available to the stems, and also keeps the water agitated.
The only real work involved in building your own bubbler is cutting the holes in the lid
. If you cant figure that one out you wouldn't be here in the first place. Size is not important(unless you move up a step and do it aero--see StinkBud for awesome diy) as you just need to be able to check your stems for roots and remove them without hurting them or breaking the fragile roots(and they are quite fragile because they have had no abuse or any reason to toughen up). They do pretty much need some sort of collar to hold them in position. I use one of the holes(the most conveinent at the time) to run my heater cord and air lines through. I use fresh(new) air line each run(stone too) but I guess it's not totally necessary. The air stone need to rest in there(no glues or caulks).
NO NUTES!! This will only create unnecessary problems, like fungus, rot, slime..............and the plant cant/wont use them until you see root
s, and
then the plant will let you know by starting to yellow as it uses up the available nutes already in the leafs/stems. Hopefully at this point your already ready to move them to the next step in your grow.
Problems I've had in 4 yrs of using this system??? Mainly the same thing as everything else...trying to rush it, make it better/faster. It's going to take from 6-14 days for roots, period. Unless your revegging something(21+days!) I wouldn't keep anything that doesn't root after 10 days unless that strain always takes that long. If I have one cut that shows root at 6 days and another similar cut that takes 12 days to root it's going to take a lot of extra work to have them come out of veg stage looking the same for an SOG, for example...... So, it is what it is.
Other than from thinking I could make it
more simple and screwing a run up, the only other problem I 've experienced was not having the water warm enough. You'd rott the roots right off a healthy plant putting them in 80degree water, not to mention cooking the nute solution into a slimey fungus mess! But you'll wait a long time trying to get roots on a cutting under 80 and it's actually preferable at 85(thinking mine is at 87 right now).
I 've never found it necessary to use any type of dome. I do mist maybe a couple of times the first couple of days but haven't always and haven't noticed a difference either way. I think my RH is around 65% in there.
Another problem I just thought of........ I was getting into a habit of adding cuttings when I saw one I wanted, etc., etc., to the point of where I was running groups of 10 instead of 50. The whole thing is that you need to do groups----run a group(5-50??), get them out and clean everything with a mild bleach solution and let dry. If you do this you dont need to worry about H2O2, which is only an emergency time buyer(and only sometimes).
Another thing of note: PH........ I grew in soil for years so really didn't even understand pH. I was rooting clones in 6.7 - 7.4 with no problems ever...... In 'hydro' we want 5.8. The last time I check the pH of my cloner water I know it was 6.9 as that's what my water comes in at as is. I 've never adjusted the pH in there and cant really see the importance of it being a solid 5.5-6.0 as the roots aren't even asimilating anything yet. So I use h2o straight from the tap, chlorine and all..............haha
In that last pic the cut I am holding has one root----------just what I want......I can get that to whatever medium I want with very minimal stress/shock and the roots just take off. The homely ones on the right in the last pic were tops of some sexed-seedlings I had to reveg.......
Let me know if I forgot anything.........