Deep Water Culture Cloning

Deep water culture hydroponics is a pretty popular method of indoor hydroponics these days. It is a relatively easy system to setup and use, but you still see some really good results. Deep water culture hydroponics is where you put your plant roots into an oxygen rich nutrient solution as the medium itself. So no use of any hydroton, rockwool, or soil to grow your plant in, just the nutrient solution itself. For this reason there are very minimal moving parts and the chances of the system failing are very low.

Deep water culture or DWC hydroponics is particularly popular with cloning. DWC clone machines are very easy to make, and are even easier to maintain so many growers like to use them. Many times a grower will build one out of a 2-5 gallon bucket, an air pump, an air stone, and some net pots. People really like the dwc cloners because all you have to do is make sure your air pump is functioning properly, then make sure there is enough water in your basin. Some growers decide to use a rooting fertilizer and many others just use de-chlorinated tap water, kept at a pH between 5 and 6.

The magic comes from the air stone which is placed at the bottom of your grow container. This air stone is what provides the much needed oxygen that the developing root system craves so much. If the water doesn’t have enough oxygen, the roots will rot and the plant will die. So it is very important to make sure you create an oxygen rich environment in order to have maximum cloning success.

The cloning process should only take about two weeks, or until you see solid white roots forming out of the bottom of your cutting. From here, you can actually add nutrients to your cloner if you would like to start vegging them right there. Otherwise you can transfer the new clone to another system, whether it be deep water culture, hydroponic, aeroponic, or even soil. That new clone will be ready to flourish in whatever system you choose.

Click here for the DIY DWC Clone Machine

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