Solo Cups with Propogation Pellets

[Timmeeeh]

Hey y'all. I've been having good luck with a perpetual grow using 2 tents. I propogate clones and veg in one tent, (1 gallon fabric pots) and flower in a second tent (3 gallon fabric pots). My question involves the after-cloning process:

After 10-21 days, when the coco pellets are finally sprouting a healthy batch of roots, I've been planting the pellets in solo cups for 8-15 days, then transplanting into the 1 gallon fabric pots for an addition 4 or 5 weeks, until the larger bloom tent is free.

Am I needlessly over-complicating things with the solo cups? Should I simply place the pellets directly in the 1 gallon pots, assuming that I am careful not to overwater?

Using the solo cups does allow me the opportunity to hit the roots a second time with mycorrhizea while up-planting, but also involves some degree of shock to the root sysem.

Obviouly, there are no absolute correct answers to gardening, but I'm curious what the forum's experiences suggest.

Thanks for your time!

[DabberDog]

Obviously, the absolute correct answer is, if it works for you, it works.
Overcomplicating? Nah. Maybe just an extra step. Your plugs don't need the Solo cup step. Except, maybe, if you are growing out several and selecting the best.

[Allotrope1000]

Hi, Timmeeeh.
I do something similar and it works great for me.
I first plant sprouted seeds into a hydrated Jiffy Pellet and place into a clean yogurt cup. Then, after root tips show, I plant into 4" plastic pots (about same size as Solo cups, but with drainage holes in bottom). When roots grow out of bottom, it's into one gallon pots until roots come out, then final planting into fabric grow pots.
I use 50/50 coco/perlite for soil, dilute GH Trio + CalMag for watering and a 150W ViparSpectra LED for seedling light. I see no transplant shock.
This technique come from the cocoforcannabis.com website.
It encourages root growth through the entire pot volume, not just curling around the bottom of the pot.
This is a little extra extra work, but results are very dependable.

[Ckbrew]

Imo you are doing too much transplanting. I start in solo cups. When the roots start showing through the drain holes in the cups they get planted in their final pot.

[Cougar672]

I generally follow what CKBrew said. When properly timed and carefully done there is no shock and the plants don't miss a beat.

[ductwizard]

i transplanted 12 autos that way and they did not seem to stunt at all. the 1 i dropped and accidently fim'd turned into my best plant

[Timmeeeh]

Thanks for the fast, strong input, growmies!

Dabberdog has a good point about using the solo cup stage to isolate the best cutting, but in my experience, the strongest rooters are always the strongest growers, so in this regard, the solo cups again don't add much to the equation.

Ckbrew Due to the limited size of my propogation/vegetation space, I don't have the luxury of planting directly into my final pots. But by the time the final transplant is made, the root ball is so well established I would have to use malicious force to disturb it. I generally see explosive growth after the final transplant. 7 days later I flip to 12/12...

I did pick up one interesting tip from y'all: I generally transplant out of the solo cups when I can see several roots growing down the side of the cup. Several of you say you wait until the roots grow out the bottom of the cup. I'll give that a look next time. Perhaps I'm transplanting too soon. The way I've been doing it there's no real rootball, and everything seems so fragile and the process seems quite clumsy.

[golfnrl]

Sounds like you have growing experience, so take this for what it's worth, as others have suggested the fewer transplants the better, but the issue with roots could be the difference in the root structure of clones vs plants from seeds. Plants from seeds have the slower tap root system and clones have a more fibrous structure. Is that what you are seeing? What color are the roots?

If you haven't already, check out the info at this link.

https://www.growweedeasy.com/cloning-marijuana-guide