Katsu on Cloning

by | Apr 1, 2020 | Uncategorized

1. Take your cutting from a healthy looking branch that isn’t very “woody” – green and flexible cuts seem to do the best.

2. Use a STERILE razor to make a diagonal cut in the stem and lightly shave the outer layer off of the bottom inch, then dip in a rooting powder or gel like clonex.

3. This is the biggie – whatever medium you are using, make sure it is BARELY damp with distilled or RO water. If your medium is too wet it will take forever to root and your stem may rot before that happens.

4. Dome your cuts to keep humidity in. If they seem to wilt, spray the inside TOP of the dome (not the cuts) to raise humidity.

5. After 3 days, start cracking your dome until they wilt, then cover again.

6. Only give your medium enough water to stay slightly damp – never wet. Squeeze out your plugs if they get too wet.

7. Adding Azos (as directed) to the distilled/RO water you use to moisten your plugs before you stick your cuts in will speed up rooting.

8. Your goal is to keep the cuts BARELY alive so as to trigger the plants survival mechanism and throw off some roots. If they are too wet they get lazy.

Peace, KB

DIY Vertical Garden

by | Feb 29, 2020 | Uncategorized

VERTICAL GARDEN FOR VEG: For more years than I care to admit, I’ve been growing my clones, seedlings, and small veging plants on the floor of a tent or the floor of my grow room. Not only is it hard on the knees and a pain in the ass, it’s messy and takes up a bunch of space. After looking at the sick-ass vertical gardens that the big light companies display at BizCon and the various cannabis conventions, I decided to take a crack at a DIY version and it CAME OUT GREAT! I’m not much of a DIY kind of guy so when I say this is easy, please take it at face value – this is really f***ing easy! I went to Costco’s website to buy a wire shelving unit (about $120 US) but you can get a similar one at all of the big box stores for about the same price. Then I purchased some 4 foot led light bars – I found a package with 6 for about $115 that come with accessories to attach them to whatever shelves you use – since I got the wire shelves the zip ties were super simple and attached in minutes. The lights themselves daisy chain together so you only have one switch to operate the whole thing. Here’s a picture (not great, but you’ll get the idea) of what it looks like finished. Start to finish you should be able to get this done in under an hour.

I purchased the 4 foot LED bars from this company for around $120

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ZCRNM25/

May your gardens stay green and your jars remain full!

Peace, KB

Male Isolation Chamber

by | Feb 3, 2020 | Uncategorized

Here are the DIY plans for the MALE ISOLATION CHAMBER posted by Logic from THCFarmer:

“This iss a little tutorial on how to grow your males right next to your females.It’s a box that isolates the male and filters all the air that moves through the box so that no pollen escapes.I built my first one of these about 4 years ago and posted it at OG.This will be the third box I’ve constructed.They are fairly simple to construct and if you purchase all of the materials new you will spend probably $40-$60.

Here’s an idea of what you’ll need:

Just about any computer fan should work for this.Just set the fan on the filter and trace around it with a pen then cut out the squares with a good heavy pair of scissors.I usually use two layers of filter for the fan to draw through.Try to use the best quality filter you can.I really like these purple Filtrete,they have the highest filtration rating I can find and they are easy to tape to the fan.
Once you’ve cut the squares you stack them on top of each other and then the fan on top.Then run some duct tape around it making a seal and mating them all together.Make sure the fan is pulling air through the filter,not pushing.
Now you need to make a hole in the top of the box,I have a 4” hole saw that worked perfect for this.
Next you need to seal the fan assembly to the box with some adhesive.You can use just about anything,silicone,latex,liquid nails.
Now you need to make a hole in the lid for an intake.Use a piece of left over filter to cover the hole and seal it with adhesive.
That’s about all there is to it.Just plug in the fan and it gently draws air through the box keeping the plant alive and the pollen contained.Here’s a pic with a female in the box to give an idea.I also screwed a board to the bottom for stability.
As you can see a clear box works best but you can use a solid box if you cut out the lid and put plexi-glass in it.

When my males show I take them out of the hydroton and re-plant them in soil then put them in the box,I can get about three in this one.I take the box away from the grow and gently open it for watering the males. I’ve been using this method for several years now without any problems.”

Once you collect the pollen, you can use a paintbrush to make your own seeds on a bud, a branch, or the entire plant depending on how many seeds you want to make. If you want to store the pollen for more than a few days make sure you use a desiccant and store it in the fridge.

May your gardens stay green and your jars remain full!

Peace, KB

Tissue Culture Propagation

by | Jan 14, 2020 | Uncategorized

Greetings! I hope your garden is green and your jars are full. I have been doing quite a bit of research on tissue culture propagation over the last few months and I am pretty sure this is the way of the future for maintaining clones over long periods of time.

If you’re not familiar with TCP, it is basically a way to rid a clone of bugs, disease/viruses, and “rejuvenate” it in a sterile sugar-based medium, create hundreds of clones in a very small space, and retard growth for easy storage. For people that pop seeds all the time this is probably of little to no interest, but for people that are trying to maintain large libraries of living genetics or that want to restore vigor to 20 year old clones, this is potentially a miracle.

Rather than spend any more time with a half-ass explanation, I have attached one of the better videos on the subject (that I’ve found, at least) that you can peruse at your leisure.

Another benefit of note is that this methodology can potentially be used to “rescue” really old seeds that have very little viability and that would never germinate under normal conditions.

TCP is really cool, even if you’re never going to do it yourself. Be sure to check the video.

Peace, KB

DIY Aerocloner

by | Dec 5, 2019 | Uncategorized

There are many different ways to clone your plants, but aerocloners may be the fastest. You can buy them easily enough but for those of you that enjoy DIY or that don’t want to spring for the extra cash, I’ve lifted some plans to build your own for a fraction of the price. Many thanks to KingRalph from ICMag for putting this together. The rest of this issue are the step-by-step plans to build your own. Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy!

Parts List:

  • 350GPH Danner Supreme Mag-Drive Utility Pump Model 3 (Model 5 500GPH for larger units)
  • 35x 2inch Neoprene Insert Collars (only 50cents a pop in the 35x bag
  • 12x Aeroponic Misters (EZ-Cloner replacement sprayers, Mister 320 etc)
  • 1x Rubbermaid Roughneck 31gal Tub or equivalent
  • Schedule 40 PVC
  • 1x 1/2″ Pipe in length
  • 1x 1/2″ Female Connector
  • 4x 1/2″ Elbows
  • 3x 1/2″ Tees

TOOLS

  • Drill
  • 2″ Holesaw
  • 11/32 Drill Bit (or 10/32 tap)
  • Glue Gun + Glue (or 2″ netpots)
  • Composite Hacksaw (something to cut PVC)

Have you pulled these things out of your back pocket yet? Vundeba, let’s begin constructing…

1. Screw the 1/2″ Female PVC onto the pump output…

2. Cut PVC pipe for a length that ends up at least 6″ below the top of the tub. Remember, you can always cut more off later, so don’t cut too short. Clean all ends of plastic, and stick the pipe in the pump’s fitting.
3. Stick 1/2″ Tee on the pipe…
4. Cut 2 equal lengths to go the long distance of the tub…
5. Put the 2 last Tees on the ends…
6. Cut 4 equal length short pieces and stick in Tees after cleaned…
7. Attach the 4 elbows…
8. Measure and Cut 2 more equal length pieces to fit your rectangle, clean, and check to see how your barebones fits together…
9. Now take apart the PVC and with an 11/32 drill bit (or 10/32 tap) drill holes for the sprayers in the pipes, and screw in the misters. sealing these isn’t really necessary, also your pvc should fit together tightly enough not to need sealing either.
As you can see that 18gal tub was a bit small, so i got the 31gal with plenty of space. Longer PVC, more misters, and a bigger pump and tub will allow you a bigger cloner, simple as that, design remains the same…

10. The Lid… drill the 2″ holes you need. Clean the stray plastic off the holes without enlarging them, do no cut the plastic further yknow. Here you can either drop in 2″ netpots, or what i had to do on some is to hot glue around the outside of the hole so the neoprene collars stuck in nicely, no netpot to fall in or for roots to get tangled in, or to buy note: experience has shown users to cut the bottom half of netpots off so roots are not damaged on removal…

Keep an eye on temps, they should be 68-78, 75F optimal.

That’s it. I hope some of you find this tutorial helpful. Until next time… May your gardens be green and your bud jars full.

Peace, KB