How to make marijuana cuttings easily

Alan Martínez Benito

CEO of Pev Grow, expert grower with more than 20 years of experience.
In constant struggle for the regulation of cannabis, mainly in the medicinal field.
03-12-2021 09:00:12 - Updated: 3 December, 2021

Did you know that marijuana can be reproduced asexually? Did you know that you can multiply a gene as many times as you want? Even better, did you know that you can create identical clones of your favorite plants? Of course you can, for that you only have to take cuttings from your plants, and that is what we are going to talk about in this article, so pay close attention because I assure you that it is one of the most important actions you can do.

⚠️ Tools and elements necessary to make marijuana cuttings

 

👾 Preparation of the plants before taking the marijuana cuttings

Another issue that must be taken into account is the hydration of the mother plants, and it is recommended to water them 3 or 4 hours before taking the cuttings so that they have the maximum humidity inside. Just as it is not good for the donor plants to have nutrient deficiencies, it is not good for them to be out of date, especially nitrogen, since an excess of this element delays the rooting process.

If you are going to use jiffys or rock wool plugs, you will have to have them ready before starting, and for that we recommend filling a bucket with water and root stimulator, adjusting the PH, and leaving them submerged for at least 15 or 20 minutes.

🧐 Preparation of the necessary elements to take cuttings

If you are going to take cuttings from different plants, you have to be able to label them correctly to know which plants they come from, since they will be identical clones of them. If you want to have cuttings of 3 different plants, the ideal is that you fill 3 glasses with water, and write the name of each variety in the glass.

In another glass you can put a small amount of rooting hormone to have it prepared, since we will use it with each cutting. It is also good to prepare several labels with the names of the varieties, to place one with each clone. Fill the sprayer with water and the recommended dose of Formulex to prepare the nutrient solution that we will give them via foliar application.

Finally,must be all the tools that we are going to use, scissors, cutters, etc.well disinfected. because by making cuts in the plants we cause possible entrances for pathogens. For this, the ideal is to have a glass with alcohol and a lighter, to immerse the tools in alcohol and then light it to ensure disinfection. It is also good that you wash your hands well and / or disinfect them with alcohol to avoid possible contamination.

🎯 First step – How to take cuttings from a marijuana plant?

First of all you have to bear in mind that the cutting is the tip of a branch of what we call mother plants, which is the cuttings donor. The moment we separate a piece of branch from a plant, we are cutting off the flow of sap that keeps it alive, so it can dry out and die if we don’t treat it quickly.

Having this part clear, now comes the most important moment, separate the cutting from the plant, but do not worry because you will understand it easily. Ideally, the cuttings should have at least 2 or 3 nodes, because at least one of them will be buried later. To make it simple, choose a branch and cut the stem between the third and fourth node, and as soon as you separate it from the mother plant you have to place it in a glass of water and make sure that the stem is submerged.

You can continue taking cuttings and putting each one of them in the glass that you have written down with the name of each mother plant, since they can be in the water for up to 24 hours without problems, although there is no need to wait. Once you have them all in water, we move on to the second step.

🔥 Second step – How to root marijuana cuttings?

We come to the moment of treating the cuttings so that they take out their own roots, and it is a delicate point of the process, but nothing difficult, do not worry. We take a cutting from the glass of water, and we make a diagonal cut just below the third node, and with the help of a cutter or scalpel we scrape the outer skin a little off the stem. This is done so that you have a larger rooting area and speed up the process.

The next thing we are going to do is cut the largest leaves in half more or less, to reduce perspiration and thus avoid dehydration. Finally, we must smear the stem with rooting hormones in the area that we have scraped previously, and introduce it in the jiffy, rock wool plug, or in the earth if we are going to use pots or seedbeds, making sure that there is at least one left or two buried knots. You already have them ready, you just need to spray the leaves with Formulex so that they have the necessary food reserves for this phase.

I recommend that as you prepare each cutting you put it in the propagator or greenhouse so that it is kept with the maximum humidity possible . Some people spray the greenhouse walls to increase the percentage of relative humidity inside. The recommended humidity for this process is 90% onwards, that is, as high as you can, and the ideal temperature is 25 degrees, and some heat in the root zone accelerates the rooting.

The greenhouse needs 18 hours of light and 6 hours of darkness every day so that the clones do not start to flower as soon as they root, but it does not have to be a very powerful light, they serve low consumption or HM. You have to control the cuttings every 2 or 3 days to ensure that the jiffy, plug, or pot does not dry out, and water with a root stimulator whenever necessary. In principle, the humidity of the irrigation itself will keep the relative humidity high, so it is not necessary to spray more.

✅ Third step – How to plant marijuana cuttings

The process of rooting cannabis cuttings usually takes between 1 and 3 weeks, depending on the genetics, the state of the mother plants, and the environmental conditions of the clones themselves. After this time, if you have put them in jiffys or rock wool plugs, you will see the roots come out through them, and at this time they can be transplanted, although it is good to wait for them to develop a little.

Planting the cuttings in pots is an action very similar to transplanting, and if you are not sure how to do it, I recommend you read the article on our blog called “How to transplant marijuana plants correctly” (coming soon) It is about filling pots with substrate in half, place a rooted cutting inside each one, and then finish filling the pots with more substrate, always taking care not to damage the roots in this process.

🚀 Fourth step – How to take care of a marijuana cutting

Once they have been transplanted, you have to irrigate with water and a root stimulator with the PH adjusted to 6.0 and keep the humidity between 80% and 90% so that they are not stressed by the change of environment, since until now they had always had it to the fullest.

From now on it can be said that the cutting has become a new marijuana plant, and what is better is that it would already be sexually mature, so it can be started to flower as soon as it is the size you want.

👌 When to make marijuana cuttings outdoors

In indoor cultivation it is easy to take the plant cuttings because we are the ones who mark the growth cycle and the flowering cycle, but outdoors the marijuana develops naturally and begins to flower spontaneously . So when are cuttings made in outdoor crops? Well, the ideal is to do them during the spring so that they have time to root and grow something before starting to bloom.

Keep in mind that indica genetics start to flower earlier than sativas, so a sativa plant can be cut into early summer with no problems. In outdoor crops all processes slow down, so the rooting phase is lengthened and instead of 10 or 15 days On average, it can take up to 20-25 days to get the first roots out.

If you want to root the marijuana cuttings outdoors, you have to put them in a greenhouse in the shade, because if you put them in the sun they can be burned to death. Otherwise the process is exactly the same as when cutting indoors.

✨ Conclusion

Making marijuana cuttings is easy but there are several factors that must be taken into account to be successful, such as the state of the mother plants, preventing dehydration, and maintaining high relative humidity conditions for several days after transplanting them. If you liked this article, we would appreciate it if you share it on your social networks so that the information reaches more people.