Ok, it's time for cloning, 101.
Melnick, if you follow what I say, I will guarantee you some healthy, rooted clones.
First, get rid of that misting bottle. It's unnecessary and actually is drowning your cuttings.
Secondly, get rid of the dome. It's unnecessary and is starving your cuttings for oxygen and helping to drown them.
The lights are not your issue. You really don't need that much light, but using LED's, there is no heat, so it won't harm the cuttings either.
Ok, Dome is outta there. Misting bottle is outta there.
Now lets start from the beginning.
1. Have your peat pellets pre-soaked and ready for the cuttings. The peat should be fully expanded and only MOIST. Not WET, Not DRY, just moist.
2. Widen the hole in the peat pellet slightly so that you don't knock or scrape off the rooting hormone when inserting the cuttings into the peat pellets. Take it all the way to the very bottom of the pellet with only a tiny bit of peat at the bottom.
3. Have your rooting hormone open and ready to dip the bottom of each cutting into.
4. Using a razor blade, not scissors, not pinching, but a nice, clean, sharp razor blade, cut a top stem at 4 to 6 inches in length.
5. Using the razor blade, remove all side branches and leaves from the cutting. Leave only 4 or 5 leaves at the very top of the cutting. I'll tell you why; You don't want the cutting to have very much photosynthesis and transpiration. More leaves will cause both. You want the cutting to alter it's growth via the rooting hormones and almost STOP growing vegetation and NOT have to support existing vegetation other than a slight amount of it to provide what photosynthesis is needed for rooting and keeping the stem alive.
6. Put your cutting into a bowl of water so that the cut end is under water. While holding it under water, cut the stem again at a nice 45 degree angle with a clean razor blade. This makes sure that an air bubble hasn't entered the stem, causing an embolism that will kill the cutting.
7. After the second cut, dip the cutting into your rooting gel or powder until it's covered to the depth that will be UNDER THE PEAT. Then give the cutting a slight tap to knock off any excess rooting hormone. It doesn't take very much of this stuff to accomplish what you need.
8. Gently place the cutting into the peat pellet and collapse the hole around it to GENTLY push the peat against the stem. I use the narrow end of a chopstick to do this.
9. Put your cutting into your clone area with a little air flow moving around them. Not much, but enough to provide some air circulation. This will prevent any humidity from forming on the leaves and causing the clone to "sweat" and drown.
10. Put the cuttings under your lights and COVER the peat pellets with some plastic or something to keep them in the DARK. Later, this will help the roots grow faster when they near the outside of the peat. For you folks that don't do this, I've done both on many experiments and covering the peat pellets works better every time.
11. DON'T MOTHER THE CUTTINGS TO DEATH. Leave them alone with the exception of making sure that they NEVER DRY OUT and are ALWAYS MOIST, BUT NOT WET.
12. Never pick up the cutting. Don't touch it. Don't pet it. Don't give it ANYTHING but plain water. Don't mist it, don't do anything to it. In about 10 days or less, you should see lots of roots starting to appear on the outside of your peat.
Get a good quality rooting hormone that includes an anti-fungal. The stuff is worth it's weight in gold to a grower.
Good luck!
not controdicting ya Growdude..as I learned a lot from ya..and am doing some clones the way you do now as well...i like all diffrent ways..but most is Bubble cloner..But had baught 100 1 inch rw last fall..so i use up..:hubba: take care and be safe
