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cloning DIY cutting cloner w/pictures and detailed instructions

FuzzyIguana said:
I have never messed w/bacteria or fungi. Mainly because I am an Infectious Disease physician and I dabble in Microbiology all day. The thought of putting things like that into my food makes me shudder. HA! I just use root gel with the classic 45 degree cut and shave some of the stem skin off to promote rapid rooting.
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I don't understand why that makes you shudder. There are already bacteria and fungi growing on, in, and around any plant you grow. Many of them have a symbiotic relationship with plants and are vital to the plants' growth. Mycorrhizae fungi has a symbiotic relationship with the majority of vascular plants, rhizobia bacteria fix nitrogen for legumes, etc. :confused: These help to fight off the pathogenic ones, a sterile medium is more dangerous than one colonized by the good fungi and bacteria.

I keep it simple when making clones. Cut the base at a ~20 degree angle, cut off most of the leaves and leave about 3-4 leaves, then snip about 40% of the tissue from the remaining leaves off. Stick them in potting mix and keep it consistently moist for the next couple weeks. No rooting hormones or humidity domes or anything, and I never have any problems getting them to root. If I had a commercial operation where shaving a week off the propagation time meant more $ then I might go with something more high tech, but it works just fine for me. Of course, some people just like to build things too. :lol:
 
I dont want to derail the original thread too much, but I kinda DID get nervous from FuzzyIguana's post, and did a reactionary change to my system. Even though I had already read similiar info as what you just posted: the same bacteria, fungi and microbes are everywhere and are mostly harmless. Still... wear at least a mask if you mess with fungi poweder.... you DONT want to inhale a pinch of it. Even harmless stuff could multiply and become dangerous if you give it enough of a jump start. The theory behind Tea's is that the culture is so diverse that no single thing can take over. At least that's how I understand it.

Some Teas can be pretty simple, like some Earth Worm Casings mixed in a bucket with molassas and air stones, or you can add mycos to get the symbiotic fungus you mention above as well.


So the last res change I did, I used 3ml/gal of 35% h202, and my roots looked like CRAP, and within 2 days every root had a dead black tip. So maybe once you start with a bennie Tea, killing it off all at once with h202 is probably NOT the best idea :) So I was kind of dumb, but my plants themselves still look great. But all the fine hairs on my roots are gone.

I am switching back to bennies and am curious to see if my stressed roots recovered. Keep in mind my plants were pretty old dirt plants that were transplanted into DWC. So maybe in cases like my plants, they already had so many bad types of bacteria (like pythium and others?) that they need to be constantly innoculated with other competing life forms. All I know is that safe doses of h202 do NOT kill pythium (root slime). That's the main reason people started looking into the Tea, to help fight off cases of established pythium. Then others noticed it helped clones take root etc. But the original person who started alot of the Tea-craze himself doesn't recommend it for everyone, usually only once there's a problem.


So if things are working great as-is, I can see why you might not want to use Tea. Because maybe once you start you cannot stop. At least you should NOT go from Tea to h2o2. Maybe you can go from Tea to no Tea however.
 
Nice looking system - don't you just love Lowe's buckets!

When you combine aeroponics with DWC, it's called an Ein-Gedi (named after the inventor of the first commercial system of this kind) system or referred to as aerohydroponics. The General Hydroponics Aeroflo is actually an Ein-Gedi.
 
Avon Barksdale said:
FuzzyIguana said:
I have never messed w/bacteria or fungi. Mainly because I am an Infectious Disease physician and I dabble in Microbiology all day. The thought of putting things like that into my food makes me shudder. HA! I just use root gel with the classic 45 degree cut and shave some of the stem skin off to promote rapid rooting.
Click to expand...

I don't understand why that makes you shudder. There are already bacteria and fungi growing on, in, and around any plant you grow. Many of them have a symbiotic relationship with plants and are vital to the plants' growth. Mycorrhizae fungi has a symbiotic relationship with the majority of vascular plants, rhizobia bacteria fix nitrogen for legumes, etc.
icon_confused.gif
These help to fight off the pathogenic ones, a sterile medium is more dangerous than one colonized by the good fungi and bacteria.

I keep it simple when making clones. Cut the base at a ~20 degree angle, cut off most of the leaves and leave about 3-4 leaves, then snip about 40% of the tissue from the remaining leaves off. Stick them in potting mix and keep it consistently moist for the next couple weeks. No rooting hormones or humidity domes or anything, and I never have any problems getting them to root. If I had a commercial operation where shaving a week off the propagation time meant more $ then I might go with something more high tech, but it works just fine for me. Of course, some people just like to build things too.
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This gave me a great fit of laughter! Thank you for these entertaining replies! Beneficial bacteria and fungi good, infectious disease physicians funny. :)

Neat cloner though. :)
 
Question: Is the Airstones necessary if the water is misting like that? Wouldn't passing through the air and splashing into the reservoir aerate it enough?
 
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