Cannabis Seeds VS Clones

Cannabis seeds VS Clones; a comparison that will allow us to see both the best and the worst of each growing method. Both of these methods have pros and cons, just like everything else in the world of cannabis; depending on the result you’re looking for you should plant either seeds or clones.

Cannabis seeds are obviously the most comfortable and easiest way to gain access to cannabis plants, and you can pick them based on flavors, effects, flowering times, sizes… there are hundreds and hundreds of different strains and seed banks. You can make your own clones from whichever plant you’d like, but people tend to buy them; the cheaper the better. When you buy clones you can’t be sure that all of them are the same strain, if they’ve rooted correctly, if they’ve been infected with fungi or insects; this basically means that buying clones is a risk that many people aren’t willing to take as they can come with infestations that can then move into your grow and screw up entire generations of plants.

When planting from seeds you can save yourself the trouble involved with all of those issues, and if one of them appears such as insects at least you’ll know where it came from and that you didn’t manage to buy it from someone. If you don’t buy clones and want to make your own, you’ll need to maintain a mother plant for quite a while which isn’t that easy.

Another big difference between growing from seeds and growing from clones is the yield that you’ll obtain once harvest time rolls around. When planting clones you know that you’re going to get more or less the same yield, appearance, flavor, aroma and potency, so it’s extremely easy to get large quantities of identical bud, like 2 kilos of the same weed for example.

If you’re growing from seeds then you will find various phenotypes within the exact same seed strain; some will be better than others, some will need more food and some will give a higher yield than others. You won’t have a balanced grow as if it were done with clones, but for many people that grow their own seeds variety is what they’re looking for. You could say that growing clones is for gourmet smokers that only like that exact strain with that exact phenotype; seeds are for growers who just want to have their own gear and like to have a varied supply and more quantity.

Clones don’t have main roots, rather than many lateral roots that act like a secondary root. These roots feed quite nicely but it’s a bit harder for them to get deeper into the substrate. This means that your clones will never have strong trunks and branches, meaning they can’t really deal with much weight. You’ll need to grow them in 12/12 right after planting them in flowerpots to flower as many as possible in as little space as possible, allowing for a decent yield. If you grow them bigger then you’ll actually end up with less of a yield. From a 600w light you can get around 350g of weed, whereas by using seeds you can get 500g in the same conditions.

Cannabis seeds grow a main root when germinated, which will grow to the bottom of the pot and then grow hundreds of secondary lateral roots out to the sides. That root will then be the plant’s main trunk, which will be thick and strong; much more so than a clone. This also makes for thicker and heavier buds than on any clone simply because of the extra weight the plant is capable of dealing with.

There are so many differences between clones and seeds; if you get clones and they’re not yours or from a trustworthy source, then I wouldn’t recommend having them in your grow. Seeds are much safer for growers just looking to smoke their own stash; there’s much more variety and yield, whereas clones can be hard to come by and aren’t always safe.

Clones are a natural reproduction process, just like seeds, and it began getting popular due to the fact that there were no feminized seeds available and if you wanted to plant indoors it was the best way to make sure they were all female plants. Nowadays you can find many strains, in fact all strains, in feminized versions, so you don’t need to plant clones anymore to be sure they’re all female.

Indoors you can grow both ways without many issues, but when it comes to planting outdoors we run into an issue. If you bring your clones outside they’ll have much less light than what you had accustomed them to and they’ll begin flowering. You can only bring clones outdoors to flower so you’ll have to plant early or reveg them, or take them out during the summer and allow them to flower in lots of teeny plants.

So, seeds will always give you more of a yield; the buds will be bigger and heavier, and you’ll have more of a variety of flavors and effects. For smokers that prefer to find a perfect strain and keep it forever, then obviously growing from clones is what you should do; you can get large quantities of the same weed in every harvest, but you’ll get a good 30% less than if you had planted seeds.

If you’re growing for yourself then we recommend planting from seeds, but if you’re a commercial producer then clones are the way to go, guaranteeing top quality and balanced product.

Author: Javier Chinesta
Translation: Ciara Murphy