Great answer thank you!

I have a new dedicated mother (prebious one in flower which you also just helped me with) but I still only took my latest clones from her by removing entire lower branches then trimming down to the individual clones.
To date, I've not been getting the best results with my technique although I just discovered some other reasons why that may be and tested them out this time (namely making the 45` cut through the node), so I'll find out in a couple of weeks how that went.

P.S. Sorry for hijacking the thread Sirsmokealot, and you have lovely looking plants there for what it is worth!