Newb having trouble figuring out reason for yellowing, cloning

skyblazer

Active Member
This is my first try at this, and I am determined not to screw it up, and with cloning just a few days away I want to make sure that I take healthy cuttings. I transplanted 1 foot plants into FoxFarm potting soil a few weeks ago, they took off and grew over 1 foot in the next 2 weeks. The 2 month mark from germination is just 5-7 days away, at which point I want to take a good number of cuttings from the two mother plants (20-40 would be great!). I have a male in flowering in a separate area that I will gather pollen from to pollinate a few buds when the time comes. Anyway, I am not sure if the yellowing is a nutrient deficiency, underwatering, or something else. I have been watering every other day since transplanting, sometimes every day a little bit, and I suspect the FoxFarm nutrients are just about depleted, but want a professional confirmation or analysis. ^_^

I have Grow Big FoxFarm 6-4-4 for the vegetative period before flowering (will be some type of a SCROG grow), while I have Botanicare Pure Blend 1.5-4-5 for flowering and Liquid Karma to supplement throughout. I wasn't familiar with FoxFarm when I started and had been convinced by the hydro store owner to go with the Botanicare for flowering when I began this experiment. He said things should work out fine switching over though and I see no reason why not.

I hope I have enough details here. There was no yellowing until the past few days and I would like to quickly take care of that so that I can take cuttings by midweek.

Thank you for the help!
 

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skyblazer

Active Member
Alright, thanks. I do usually wait though until almost dry to water. I will put the 400W MH in there though to supplement. Hope that works.

Thanks!
 

durbandude

Active Member
Alright, thanks. I do usually wait though until almost dry to water. I will put the 400W MH in there though to supplement. Hope that works.
Yes it will work - weed doesn't like wet feet, but it doesn't like dry feet either - depending on your growing environment, relative humidity, etc will affect how regularly you need to water.

Looks like you're using some decent quality grow medium, it looks too that it could stand a dry-out. Weed also likes oxygen at the roots, so remember that the grow medium must be "fluffy" and "loose-ish" so that moisture drains quickly and sucks ambient dissolved gasses into the root system.

On the other hand, more light will improve your situation. Good luck and let us know how the cloning goes.

Peace. D.D.
 

skyblazer

Active Member
Alright. The advice and information is highly appreciated. The input gives me a few ideas for improvement so thank you!

The temperature fluctuation has been a concern of mine as it has been up to 95F on occasion with the Rh hovering quite consistently around 40%, but I had that problem more earlier on as well, and they seemed to do fine. However, I am hoping it will cool down quickly this fall so that I can keep the a/c off as much as possible and later allow the lights to heat this place to a certain extent to keep the electric bill down. On the other hand, I would probably just take more cuttings and add another light if that is the case. :p I am hoping for a great enough yield for a 1 years+ supply for me and some friends.

Anyway, I will update after cloning.
 

skyblazer

Active Member
Something I have been searching for for a while now is how much of the plant must remain after taking cuttings to allow it to procure sufficient resources to still survive. I don't expect a magic number, but either a range of number of branches or a percentage range. I would prefer to keep the plant in case I decide to do some more cloning again in a few weeks or a month rather than using one of the cuttings for a new mother plant.

On another note, my sequestered male plant began bursting its sacks yesterday so I have collected pollen to get seeds from a few buds later on. Consequently, I will be discarding the plant early next week. I'm not sure where or how yet...maybe I will just eat it? :D
 

mockingbird131313

Well-Known Member
Something I have been searching for for a while now is how much of the plant must remain after taking cuttings to allow it to procure sufficient resources to still survive.
Always be conservative. You want the plant to recover from the cutting loss in 14 days. I usually like to try and make a few cuttings on 2 or 3 weekends a month. Then I have plants in different developement all the time.
 

durbandude

Active Member
Always be conservative. You want the plant to recover from the cutting loss in 14 days.
Very wise information - CONSERVATIVE

Another thing to remember, that as much of the plant as you see is actually represented by what we can't see - the rootsystem.

In some horticultural activities, such as bonsai, root balls are trimmed within a 1/3 of what was originally there in relation to how much foliage, branches etc are remaining. This leaves enough "stuff" to balance the needs of the plant, and it's natural functions: growing.

If you took a nice mother, and left her with too little foliage to support it's root system, one, or more of the following things may happen.

1. Not enough photosynthesis = not enough food for plant = slow growth
2. Not enough photosynthesis = not enough work for the roots = root rot
3. Death = can't do anything about that.

Everything in moderation with a good helping of patience is the way to go!

However, when I put a clone into flowering - I usually strip it of everything except the top sprout, and transplant. It's unbelievable at how quickly they pick up, and within two weeks, my girls will go from 12"-2 feet! Another week later, another foot of growth - and then it plateaus out to an average of about 3 1/2 - 4 foot max. (sativas) When working with clones by the dozen, you can afford to loose one or two, but you can't afford to loose a mother. Your call.

Peace. D.D.
 

durbandude

Active Member
Always be conservative. You want the plant to recover from the cutting loss in 14 days.
Very wise information - CONSERVATIVE

Another thing to remember, that as much of the plant as you see is actually represented by what we can't see - the rootsystem.

In some horticultural activities, such as bonsai, root balls are trimmed within a 1/3 of what was originally there in relation to how much foliage, branches etc are remaining. This leaves enough "stuff" to balance the needs of the plant, and it's natural functions: growing.

If you took a nice mother, and left her with too little foliage to support it's root system, one, or more of the following things may happen.

1. Not enough photosynthesis = not enough food for plant = slow growth
2. Not enough photosynthesis = not enough work for the roots = root rot
3. Death = can't do anything about that.

Everything in moderation with a good helping of patience is the way to go!

However, when I put a clone into flowering - I usually strip it of everything except the top sprout, and transplant. It's unbelievable at how quickly they pick up, and within two weeks, my girls will go from 12"-2 feet! Another week later, another foot of growth - and then it plateaus out to an average of about 3 1/2 - 4 foot max. (sativas) When working with clones by the dozen, you can afford to loose one or two, but you can't afford to loose a mother. Your call.

:peace: D.D.
 

durbandude

Active Member
Always be conservative. You want the plant to recover from the cutting loss in 14 days.
Very wise information - CONSERVATIVE

Another thing to remember, that as much of the plant as you see is actually represented by what we can't see - the rootsystem.

In some horticultural activities, such as bonsai, root balls are trimmed within a 1/3 of what was originally there in relation to how much foliage, branches etc are remaining. This leaves enough "stuff" to balance the needs of the plant, and it's natural functions: growing.

If you took a nice mother, and left her with too little foliage to support it's root system, one, or more of the following things may happen.

1. Not enough photosynthesis = not enough food for plant = slow growth
2. Not enough photosynthesis = not enough work for the roots = root rot
3. Death = can't do anything about that.

Everything in moderation with a good helping of patience is the way to go!

However, when I put a clone into flowering - I usually strip it of everything except the top sprout, and transplant. It's unbelievable at how quickly they pick up, and within two weeks, my girls will go from 12"-2 feet! Another week later, another foot of growth - and then it plateaus out to an average of about 3 1/2 - 4 foot max. (sativas) When working with clones by the dozen, you can afford to loose one or two, but you can't afford to loose a mother. Your call.

:peace: D.D.
 

skyblazer

Active Member
I'm leaving for the weekend, but wanted to get this in before I do. The 10 on the left were taken today. The 5 to the right of them were taken Sunday 8/24, and the 5 to the right of them were taken 8/22. The 10 on the right have looked as strong the entire time as when I first cut them. The 10 today didn't look quite as good and I hurried things, but hopefully it will work out.

I haven't mentioned yet that these are northern lights from nirvana. The plants smell exquisite already. :) Ozone generators (ozn-jr for now, air tiger later when needed) are in use for odor control and are working quite well.

Edit:
Took 5 more cuttings. I forgot to mention that I am using clonex cloning gel. Also, I soaked the rockwool cubes in a 15mL/gallon water Botanicare liquid karma solution for 24hrs+.
 

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skyblazer

Active Member
First roots showed up at 13 days! Man, I am so glad that worked out. Will be gone a week after today, but I may update later with some more pics.
 

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skyblazer

Active Member
Well, I had set up an automatic watering system for the two plants quickly before leaving for a week. When I returned 1 plant was dead, because the watering system was apparently inadequate for enough water to reach the plant the way I had it set up. Fortunately the other mother plant is thriving still, and I have 23 cuttings that were transplanted last week. Another 8-10 or so that will be transplanted today or tomorrow. The ones already transplanted were done on different days and so are showing various levels of progress, but overall I am quite satisfied, but have decided that I will probably flower my current mother plant along with the cuttings, and instead grow 3-6 new smaller mother plants. Efficiency should be increased that way as well. Pictures to follow later today or this evening, depending on when I complete what I have to do now, which will take hours of work so I am not sure yet if I will finish today or not, depending on how lazy I feel later.
 

skyblazer

Active Member
I'm still working things out, but have them in flowering. Hopefully will be ready in about 5-6 weeks and ready for drying and manicuring. I will post pics eventually. Thanks!
 

skyblazer

Active Member
So I am pretty sure I wiped out everything by not having adequate airflow and slightly too high humidity. I am about to clean and start over, but thought I would ask if anyone has any idea how to completely kill the botrytis to save at least part of it. I only had 2 weeks to go!
 
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