clones versus seeds the big debate (by happy)

[the happy chappie]

hello guys
well here we go again,
seeds or clones what do you choose, this question has been subjected to much debate over the years, and maybe this thread will help anyone who would like to choose, personnally and realisticly i have to use both, but there are plenty of reasons why either are as good and as usefull as each other.
i will attemp in this thread to take some clones for you. and start some seeds at the same time and match them side by side in the same room and show you the results as they happen,

i am up against the odds a little as the clones i shall be taking will come from mothers that are in full flower, but i need to do this as i want to carry on my strain and need some fresh seed stock for the new year.

i predict that the end result will be the same, the cloned plants will be much the same as there mother, the seeds will catch up and finish about the same time,

clones will carry all of the genre of there parents, if you have good mothers, then generally you will get good cloned offspring

seeds give you that option of re-populating your stock, using the staminate plants that you get.

the seeds that i shall use stem from parents of my strain and are f1 decendants, some of the clones i grow will be crossed with some of seeds that grow into staminate plants. there for by selective choosing of the best staminate seed plant with my best pistillate clones i shall be back crossing and reinforcing the traits that make up the genre of my strain.

i shall today take clones and start some seeds, i will take pics of the whole process and post them when i have finished. i hope this will help anyone that would like to know, i welcome any comments and suggestions.
................. peace to you all .................. happy ..................

[Torog]

hello guys
well here we go again,
seeds or clones what do you choose, this question has been subjected to much debate over the years, and maybe this thread will help anyone who would like to choose, personnally and realisticly i have to use both, but there are plenty of reasons why either are as good and as usefull as each other.
i will attemp in this thread to take some clones for you. and start some seeds at the same time and match them side by side in the same room and show you the results as they happen,

i am up against the odds a little as the clones i shall be taking will come from mothers that are in full flower, but i need to do this as i want to carry on my strain and need some fresh seed stock for the new year.

i predict that the end result will be the same, the cloned plants will be much the same as there mother, the seeds will catch up and finish about the same time,

clones will carry all of the genre of there parents, if you have good mothers, then generally you will get good cloned offspring

seeds give you that option of re-populating your stock, using the staminate plants that you get.

the seeds that i shall use stem from parents of my strain and are f1 decendants, some of the clones i grow will be crossed with some of seeds that grow into staminate plants. there for by selective choosing of the best staminate seed plant with my best pistillate clones i shall be back crossing and reinforcing the traits that make up the genre of my strain.

i shall today take clones and start some seeds, i will take pics of the whole process and post them when i have finished. i hope this will help anyone that would like to know, i welcome any comments and suggestions.
................. peace to you all .................. happy ..................
Howdy happy,

As per usual,it's always a pleasure to hear from ya..and this is a good project for those of us who have a few grows under our belts and are curious about the pro's and con's of seeds vs clones. I've always heard,that in terms of results,starting from seed is best,that the yield is more and also more potent. Whereas clones are much faster and yield less,and one is ensured that it will be female. Also,that seedlings are less prone to disease and are hardier plants,is a consideration too. It takes some practice and natural skill,to git cloning down right,but it pays off in terms of time needed to veg,therefore reducing overall cost and the added savings can be used to reinvest in the grow room infrastructure.

Say..did ya read the post by Stormcooker ? Have you thought of using beneficial microbes in yer root zones ? I'm very interested in the subject myself,and just wonder if you have delved into that area much ?

Have a good one !

[SeedKing72]

I realize you need to clone in flower.. But doesnt that kinda skew the results. I mean are they not at a disadvantage from start verse taking them from Veg,I look forward to your results.. Now some newbie questions:

1. Dont clones yield the same as the mother, under the same environment
2. Do clones degrade over time?

[hubblebubble]

clones as it eliminates the possibility of females and i find that you will have a quicker harvest as they kind of have a head start as they are basically a small plant

[the happy chappie]

hi torog/seedking/hubblebubble

hi torrog, yes you can save a lot of time with clones, for sure if you have cloned from a pistillate plant then you will not get any boys mate, thats a big plus, i am not sure though that time is save to much in respects of growing and finishing, as i like to stick my seedlings under 12+12 at an early age, if you have a big grow, then clones is the only real path to take, as if you get it right they will all be very uniform and predictable, i think thats a big plus, when you kinda know what to expect,.... yes i did read that post, i feed my plants with worm casts, its expensive, but it dont get much more natraul than that, its also a top fert, the root zone grow with this as a medium will thrive beautifully. peace mate ...

hi seedking72, yeah i am at a disadvantage from the start mate, these clones will take a little longer, some wont even make it, but this will be a good learning point for anybody who wants to know if it can be done, they will still finish around the same time as they will be in the same room under the same lighting conditions, they wont have much choice as i will be indusing flower when i want it to show not when it wants to. in answer to your questions, as a rule of thumb, clones will carry all the genre of the parent plant male or female, basicly the strain will be the same, but many factors decide the yeald and quality, clones dont degrade over time, but what can happen is they kinda get inbread to heavily, its a bit like the humam race, if humans was to breed with there own familys, i.e.bro with his sis or mother and son, then there will be a chance soon enuff down the line of difformaties, its the same with most of the animal kingdom, thats why its a good thing to use the a mother once in a while for seed, then from that seed pick a good father , cross that father with your best cloned mother, it kinda strenghens the strain without chancing difformaties, you can also reverse that, grow the seed and pic a mum, the have a cloned staminate plant use the pollon from the male to pollonate the girl, the result is much the same as both male and female plants make up 50% each of the strains genre, ..... peace ....

hi hubble, yeah they are a small plant, but when you take into concideration that on average clones take around 10 days to grow enough roots to transplant there aint that much in it, this time i have to clone a heavily flowered mum. these are going to take anything up to a month to get themself sorted, thats about 8/9 days to revert back to veg, and about 20 or so days to grow the roots, by then hopefully the seeds will be about the same size as the clones, this wil be a tough grow though, but hey , i love a chalange, peace

i have tried to get this done this week end but the weather is crap, so i will do it just as soon as i can, ........ peace to you all .......... happy .............

[notanovice]

let me see
clones taken from 1 month old plant
forced flowered to show sex in a week
that`s five weeks and plant is sexed
males removed
take 10 to 20 clones off mother
bud in 6 to eight weeks
take clones off mother every two weeks
constant flo of buddage every two weeks
hmmm seeds , just repeat process of changing mothers every 8 months to 1 year

[the happy chappie]

hi guys
hi notanovice, yeah thats kinda the way it works mate, you can keep mothers going for quite a while, but its allways best to change them for fresh ones every now and then, if you keep chopping bits of a mum time after time, then for sure she will spit back at ya just when you need her most. repeated mutilation is a common reason for a mum to go hermie, and who wants a hermie...
i am still waiting for a chance to get out there and do this, i have had a few probs here at the moment, and i am also a bit worried that these girls are just to far into flower to risk it, i have plenty of seed thet will be ok, its just i like fresh seeds.
if i cant do this guys i am sorry to have let ya down, espeicaly if you have been following this thread, peace to all of ya and sorry if i cant follow up on this perticular thread..... ............ peace ........... happy ..............

[Neojedi]

Hello Chappie,
It's been awhile since I've been thru here.I have a related question,....Were you ever able to successfully clone that feminized Strawberry Cough?And if so, what worked? My efforts with the Super Silver Haze were a bust :mad: , mite invasion this summer killed the seedlings.But, working now with a nl/shiva. It's in week 1 of bloom, retained a male to collect pollen from and will dust a g13/HP cutting that's in bloom .I'm trying to get a little better yeild from the g13/hp. It came to me as a cutting, great quality, but zero stretch.

[the happy chappie]

hello neojedi,
i never got the strawberry cough to sprout, i got there seeds to split but thats as far as they got, they never broke the surface, i was gutted, really sorry to here about the silver haze mate, we do get the mites here but i have a bigger problem with caterpillars, ..... as for crossing i like to use cotton buds and a sterile plastic container. i find it easy to avoid over ferting to many buds, sounds like you have a nice mix there mate, ............it was good to here from you again ...........

hi growtrade center, ............ thanks ........... peace happy ..............

[Neojedi]

Hello Chappie,

Seeds or clones? I think the ability to inbreed selectively, is a plus to the seed side if you have a hybrid you are happy with. Now if you are cloning from clones each harvest, I would think after time you would get some degradation.
Cloning from a mother would have to be the most efficient, space allowing.

[redvetttes]

there one thing u never say with a clone

dam another FXXXXXXX Male

lol

[the happy chappie]

hi neojedi
hello mate, yeah clones from a mum is pretty well the best way to go, thats if you dont want to change things in anyway, and yes if you only ever cloned from clones then for sure some degradiation will take place, i use both methods, i clone to limmit the amount of staminate plants i grow, i fertilise certain selected clones with selected staminate plants to give me seedstock that will give me both pistilate and staminate plants of the exact same genre, after germinating and growing these seeds, over a long time, they have become pretty much dependable, i sort of know just what to expect from them, i have tinkered with a few of them this year, i could not get pics as i did not have time, but i have infused some with pollon from a very fast and full body chronic, and two others with a very deep purple and heavily flowering purple haze n/l X it should be interesting, i dont know if i answered any questions but yeah i use both seeds and clones, to me both are equally importent, i could not keep the genre going if i did not.

hi redvetttes,.... i clone males as well, especialy if i have a good one, remember male plants have 50% of what it takes to make that genre, so if you have a male thats really fast, stinks like a polecat, and finishes the ideal hight, why throw it away, i say let it do its thing on a pretty young girl and see what her babys turn out like ....
................. peace ................. happy ....................

[Neojedi]

I have a question for ya Happy,
Up until now, whenever I have crossed a strain, I am using whatever male appears to best growth characteristics(from whatever has come up from the seeds and then I discard). I have just ordered a Afghani x Bluebery/haze, solely for crossing with a sweet skunk I've had for about 8 years.(trying to impart a little more Sative in the strain) Would the best choice be to collect pollen from several of the males, pollinate one plant, and then grow out the f1s and search for the right male and female phenos I'm trying to get? And then inbreed those select f1s for stability? Thanks, my partner freaks when I have males in the house, think I may work on a breeding lab project :D

[the happy chappie]

hi neojedi
hello mate, i wish ya luck with your crossing mate, most haze varieties will cross into your sweet skunk fairly easy, it might take a few grows to stabilize them a little though, personly i only collected pollon from my bests male, i rarely use different male pollon together, i like to know from the start who's the daddy if you have the room then deffinately use the pollon on other plants i have done a very simular cross just a couple of years ago, the only prob i had was the sativa came through to much, it turned out more sativa than i wanted, it was a lovely smooth smoke that was quite sweet really, but it did loose some of the kick ass punch that was present in the original mum, it also slowed by at least 2 weeks, i worked on it for about 6/7 grows during which time i had crossed it again with a cloned offspring, it did put back that heavy stone that i need, and now looked far more indica, however becourse the branches were very long and looked a little thin i had to stake every branch, buds were very long and heavy and strangly fluffy they were heavy on day of harvest, but when dryed they seemed to lose a lot of weight, much more than was expected, it turned out a lovely smoke mate and i am sure your gonna enjoy i did, i did not have room to keep it going, and it did not cope to well with the damp and cold uk nights when grown outside mate, but hey, if you have the room mate your gonna have fun, mine was not smelly though, it hardly stank at all, it just left a strong orange smell on my hand when handled and it was really sticky, but not frosty, it just had a shinny sticky ooooh i dont know how else to describe it, oh and its seed were huge mate, i have never seen such big pot seeds, i have got myself too stoned mate, i gotta go, i hope this helps....... peace anytime .................. happy .............