Clone Mom Root Pruning

I just had one fairly small plant as a clone mom and after taking a bunch of cuttings it was reduced to the main stem and numerous small growing tips to regrow from. Since it's in about a 5" pot and had been growing for quite a while I got the idea to prune the roots back to equalize better with the cut back tops. Went around the medium in the pot with a knife, halfway between stem and pot, all the way to the bottom, cutting the root mass in half basically. Grew back real nice, never looked better.

Point being, cutting back roots to even out with cut back tops is a good way to keep a clone mom healthy in the same pot for an extended time, and can be done without removing the plant from the pot with this easy method. After a bunch of times I suppose you would eventually want to repot though.

Nice to hear, this is something I would like to do soon.

How old is the plant and how tall is it?
Also how long did it take for the plant to recover?

newguy123 said:

Nice to hear, this is something I would like to do soon.

How old is the plant and how tall is it?
Also how long did it take for the plant to recover?

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It's a small plant, like a foot high. Just started regrowing normally, no delay or anything. From what I've read, when plant tops are cut back some of the roots die off to equalize it. Well I just sped things up by cutting a bunch of the roots back with that knife. Maybe there IS a delay if you don't cut the roots back though, while the plant tries to equalize things the slow way. I've actually done it before with a big mom plant in a pot about 8" diameter. Kept it in that same pot for a couple years, perfectly healthy. Never repotted once.

I keep small mother plants in 1 litre pots & root prune roughly every 6 months. There are a few guides online for keeping small mums, often referred too as keeping bonsai mums. As long as you prune the top a bit & the roots every now & then you can keep a plant in a small pot indefinitely. If you're short on space it is a great way of keeping mother plants.

kushedy said:

I keep small mother plants in 1 litre pots & root prune roughly every 6 months. There are a few guides online for keeping small mums, often referred too as keeping bonsai mums. As long as you prune the top a bit & the roots every now & then you can keep a plant in a small pot indefinitely. If you're short on space it is a great way of keeping mother plants.

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My plant is just enough to get the 12 cuttings I need. Don't really need a big mom for that. But when I take the cuttings all that's left is the stalk and tiny growing points and a few mature leaves on the stalk. I don't need big cuttings because I'm giving them 5 weeks total rooting/veging time now. I just keep pruning back as required. I want a good sized stem thickness by the time I start flowering. Doesn't matter how much top growth there is, as long as there's a good thick stem the plant will grow large quickly when switched. But if the stems are thin, due to too short a veg time, they'll never become big enough plants to yield good weight. I don't prune the clone roots though, just the tops. I want as much root on them as possible.