If the term ‘monster cropping’ makes you scratch your head, don’t worry: most professional weed growers haven’t used this advanced technique, nor do they have any idea what it means. But after reading this article, you’ll both grasp the concept and be ready to use this amazing method yourself for record-breaking harvests.
What Is Monster Cropping?
Without a doubt, you know what cloning is. You also probably know that normally, you should take clones from a cannabis plant that’s still vegging. But what happens if you let your plant enter the flowering stage and THEN take a cutting from it?
Actually, this is exactly what monster cropping is all about: growing cannabis from a clone that’s been taken from a flowering mother. You revert the clone to veg and get a plant that’s just as healthy and vigorous, but also has better yield potential.
The word ‘monster’ in monster cropping refers to three things: at the initial stage, the cuttings will look downright ugly with all those roundish, single-leaflet leaves and a thicket of branches growing everywhere. Then, it will frighten you with the insane number of bud sites growing so close together that the plant will look like a football. Last, but not least come the monster harvests.
Monster Cropping Cannabis Has Many Pros, But Also Some Cons
Huge yields are clearly an upside that any grower would welcome, but we want to be honest with you: there are some downsides as well. Keep the following in mind if you want the best experience possible.
Pros Of Monster Cropping
- If for some reason you’ve missed the right moment to take clones in the regular way, monster cropping gives you a chance to still do it and probably get even better results.
- If you take clones from a flowering plant, you know more about it and can more easily tell a keeper from other, inferior phenos.
- You won’t need a special place dedicated to keeping mother plants. Just take a cutting from a plant that’s already flowering and on its way to harvest, and after the clone has rooted and grown some, make it flower, too. Then you can take new cuttings from it, and so on and so forth.
- Starting from the second generation of monster cropping, the plants will have so many branches that you can take as many clones as you need without slowing down the growth of the parent plant or compromising its future yields.
- You can turn your cutting into a very wide but not very tall, multi-branch bush that, given enough time, can fill the whole grow tent on its own.
- You can use any canopy management method along with monster cropping: topping, fimming, supercropping, LST, HST, etc., with the scrOG technique being the best option possible.
- With a lot of branches, multiple bud sites, and an even canopy, the yields from each plant will be spectacular.
Cons
- You can’t use monster cropping on autoflowers. It’s impossible to re-veg an auto once it has entered the flowering stage. Btw, cloning an autoflowering plant that’s still in veg doesn’t make any sense, either.
- Not all photoperiod strains are equally suitable for monster cropping. Those that are compact, with very short internodes, are not very convenient to work with. Slow vegetative growth of some varieties is another impediment.
- You need more time for each growing cycle compared to regular cloning, because cuttings with flowers on it will need an extra week or two to revert to the vegetative stage.
- Not all clones will root, so you’ll have to take more cuttings than normal.
Is Monster Cropping Marijuana Worth It?
If you’re still questioning whether you should take the risk and try this advanced cannabis training technique, the answer is definitely yes – monster cropping marijuana is worth it! If you’re not a complete newbie and have had some previous experience growing cannabis (or at least done thorough research), you should try monster cropping.
First, a monster-cropped plant is a source of unlimited clones that can bear buds of your favorite genetics, cutting after cutting. Yes, not every cutting will survive, but keep in mind that every successful attempt at monster cropping is another healthy, branchy plant that you can use for the same technique again later.
Second, you need to remember that flowering clones acquired through monster cropping weed behave differently than classic clones taken during the vegetative stage. Namely, they will grow to become bushier, branchier, and more high-yielding compared to regular clones. If you still aren’t convinced that you should give monster cropping a shot with your plant, here are detailed instructions that will show you that monster cropping weed isn’t actually that difficult.
Find out more about monster cropping on Herbie's Seeds blog