Big Thanks To Costa Mesa Steve For His Contributions to this post.

Taking clones from flowering plants goes against all that has been said about cloning cannabis and might therefore seem a bit confusing at first but the science behind the technique is sound and the results speak for themselves.

You start by taking clones of a plant that is about 21 days into flowering. This seems to be the best time to do it but you can also takes clones at a later stage with the same results. The lower branches make better clones as they have not yet become rigid and will also root faster and more easily than say the top cola. Move the new cutting into a glass of water and let it sit for a while in order to make sure that no air gets into the vascular system during handling, as this can be fatal to your new plant. You should make the cut so that it runs along the stem as this will increase the surface area for water and possibly nutrient uptake, depending on what method of cloning you use. Personally, I have found that using a small hydroponic setup or a propagation bubbler is by far the best way to clone cannabis plants. I will not expand on the subject of cloning here, if you need more information on how to clone your plants, have a look at the official cloning thread by JJScorpio

In the picture below, you can see how the clone from a flowering plant been has placed in a propagation bubbler for rooting and re-vegging. This also means that you will have to put the clone back under a veg light schedule of 18/6, 20/4 or even 24/0. Clones do not need strong light so a small CFL will do. You can remove some of the buds at this stage in order to encourage the plant to revert back into its vegetative cycle but leave the topmost flower alone.

It will take several weeks for the clone to root, some never do, so it is best that you take a great number of clones at the same time in order to ensure that at least one makes it on to the next stage. It might be a good idea to place the clones inside a humidity dome, which can be bought at gardening stores or custom built for your specific needs. The high humidity inside the dome will make sure that the plants do not dry out and die. Ventilate the dome every day just to make sure that the plants don’t get attacked by mold.

Keep in mind however that the most important thing when it comes to cloning is to provide the fresh cuttings with plenty of oxygen and that is why the propagation bubbler is so effective compared to other methods.

The clones might be a sad sight at first but as soon as they root, they will also revert back into the vegetative stage and start growing again. Once the clones have rooted properly and started growing again, they will put out single unserrated leaves at first but the normal leafs are soon to follow. It might be a good idea to apply some training at this stage, tying down some of the tops will encourage even more branching. You can also provide some heat underneath the clones as this will speed up the rooting process considerably.

When the plant starts growing again, the incredible branching power of the flowering clone becomes apparent.

As you can see, this plant has grown into a real monster, and all this without ever topping the plant. That’s the beauty of this technique; you can forget all about topping and FIM’ing since the flowering clone will sprout all these new branches all by itself.

This plant is now perfectly suited for a SCROG or perhaps even a SOG grow. This one plant can easily fill up an entire Scrog net in no time. Several of these plants grown in SOG will definitely give you a grand harvest.

There are other benefits from using this technique; it also removes the need for keeping mother plants. When the newly re-vegged plant is flowered, it can also provide more clones for a perpetual harvest. Recycling at its best. This might be of interest to those who need to keep down their number of plants.

Needless to say, this method is highly effective thanks to the heavy branching that occurs after a flowering clone is re-vegged. With further training and some patience, you will get some real monster plants and thereby also a monster harvest.

Example:

http://www.theweedblog.com/monster-cropping-marijuana-plants/

Scotty & the Dude talk about monster cropping:

Monster Cropping Interview