Growing clones from dispensaries indoors, then cloning them yourself

Growing clones from dispensaries indoors starts you with a cutting from one mother plant, so it carries that plant’s genetics and sex; the supplier’s record is what tells you which mother it was. One healthy clone can supply every plant after it. Keep it under vegetative light as a mother, take tip cuttings with two to three nodes, dip them in rooting hormone and hold them warm and humid until roots form. Cornell’s hemp propagation guidance puts the rooting room at about 72 to 75°F with 16 hours of light a day. The catch is the limit: California allows not more than six living plants per private residence, and a mother plus a tray of cuttings reaches six quickly.

If your clone is still settling in, start with our first two weeks with a dispensary clone, which covers the counter check, transplant and first watering. The full home-grow guide covers the whole season.

Last reviewed: November 2026.

Growing clones from dispensaries indoors starts with a clean plant

A clone from a licensed store has a paper trail. Under the DCC regulations, it must come from a licensed nursery or microbusiness and be non-flowering and under 18 inches tall and wide, and the store cannot spray it. That does not tell you whether it carries hop latent viroid, the disease California growers once called dudding. Oregon State University Extension says the viroid travels in cuttings from infected mothers, that young plants often show no symptoms, and that cuttings from infected plants tend to root poorly.

So before you turn a clone into a mother, grow it alone for a few weeks and watch it. OSU’s advice to commercial growers is to test mother plants before taking cuttings, and it notes that roots can test positive about two weeks after a cutting is made. A home grower can at least ask the store which nursery produced the clone and whether that nursery tests its stock.

Keep a mother plant in vegetative growth

A mother plant is simply a plant you never flower. The University of Saskatchewan grow guide describes mothers as plants kept in vegetative growth indefinitely to provide cuttings, which means at least 14 hours of light a day and usually 18. Keep it at 21 to 26°C and 50 to 60% humidity, water when the pot is about half its soaked weight, and prune it to keep it a manageable size.

Feed it properly. In Clemson University work presented in a Cornell hemp propagation webinar, stock plants fed 200 or 300 ppm nitrogen stayed green and produced larger plants with more cuttings to harvest than plants fed 100 ppm. Cornell’s guidance also says to take cuttings from a well-established, healthy plant, preferably one that is not flowering.

Count your plants as you go. Health and Safety Code section 11362.2(a)(3) allows adults 21 and over not more than six living plants within a single private residence or on its grounds at one time, and (a)(2) requires them to be kept in a locked space not visible from a public place. The statute counts living plants and does not define a cutting, rooted or not. The cautious reading is to count every living cutting, from the moment you take it, toward the six. A mother plus five cuttings in a dome is already six, so take only as many as you mean to keep. In Oregon, OLCC allows four plants per residence. This is general information, not legal advice.

The best cannabis cloning setup is small and clean

You need less than the grow shops suggest. Cornell’s list: a sharp knife, clippers or razor, cleaned and disinfected; a propagation medium; rooting hormone (the webinar cites 0.1% IBA, or 1,000 ppm, as a standard powder strength); a humidity dome or mist system; and labels. Set the dome under a gentle light on a 16-hour day, and aim for air around 72 to 75°F with the root zone 2 to 3°F warmer, which a seedling heat mat under the tray can provide.

The medium matters less than keeping it evenly moist. In a Cornell trial with a CBD hemp cultivar, cuttings were dipped in rooting gel, stuck in three media and checked daily, misted whenever they started to dry. All three rooted, each with a trade-off, as the table shows.

How to take a cutting, step by step

Step 1: clean your blade. OSU says ethanol and hydrogen peroxide do not inactivate hop latent viroid, while bleach solutions, hypochlorous acid and skim milk can. Clean the tool again before you move to the next plant.

Step 2: choose a healthy growing tip and cut a piece with two to three nodes, about 5 to 8 inches long, per Cornell’s guidance.

Step 3: trim off the large lower leaves and clip the tips of big fan leaves on top, so the cutting loses less water while it has no roots.

Step 4: lightly wound the bottom of the stem and treat it with rooting hormone.

Step 5: push it into pre-moistened medium, label it with the date and the mother, and set it under the dome.

Step 6: check every day. Mist when the medium or leaves start to dry, keep the temperature steady, and leave the dome on until roots appear at the sides or bottom of the plug.

When cuttings root, and how to store them

Rooting takes a few weeks. Cornell’s photos show coco-plug cuttings with healthy roots 24 days after sticking. When white roots poke out of the plug, open the dome a little more each day and move the cutting into a pot, the same way you would a new dispensary clone.

Cuttings start losing water the moment they are cut, which is why the Cornell trial dipped and stuck them right away and checked them daily so they would not dry out. The practical answer to storing cuttings is not to: have the tray, medium and dome ready before you cut, and take only what you will stick that day.

Pests, sprays and the rest of the grow

A humid dome suits pests and mold as much as it suits roots, so inspect leaves and the medium surface every time you check moisture. If you treat anything, use only products that meet California criteria for legal use on cannabis. Once cuttings are potted they follow the normal vegetative and flowering steps in our home-grow guide, and our grower’s glossary explains the topping and training terms you will meet next.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• California Health and Safety Code section 11362.2
• DCC: What's legal
• Judicial Council of California: Prop 64 guide (Couzens and Bigelow)
• DCC: Text of regulations (section 15408)
• OSU Extension: Hop latent viroid in hemp
• USask: Vegetative growth
• Cornell Hemp webinar: Propagation of hemp (Bridgen, 2023)
• Cornell Hemp: Clonal propagation of TJ's CBD in different media
• California DPR: Pesticide products legal for use on cannabis

For adults 21+ (18+ with a physician’s recommendation in California). Keep out of reach of children and pets. Do not drive or operate machinery after use.