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Rooting Hormones
What Are They , and How Do They Work ?
by Jason Mispagel , contributing writer
Jason Mispagel is the co-owner and operator of Year-Round Garden , a grower ’ s supply center serving both home and commercial customers since 2016 . His extensive growing experience in hydroponics and soil dates to the early days of legalization in Colorado , where he served as one of the state ’ s early caregivers . Year-Round Garden . 1225 W 103rd St , Kansas City , MO . 816.216.6917 – FB : yrroundgarden ● IG : @ yrroundgarden
Reproducing plants by taking cuttings from existing ones is nothing new . This “ cloning ” process can occur on its own in nature with zero human intervention , but it has also become a popular tool for both amateur and professional growers . Whether you want to share one of your favorite plants with a friend , expand your garden or increase the consistency of your harvests , cloning is a great option .
For a full tutorial on the cloning process , check out the October 2020 issue of The EVOLUTION Magazine ( see www . TheEvolutionMag . com ) where Ryan Van Horn provides step-by-step instructions . This month ’ s article , however , focuses on a single step in that process ― the use of rooting hormones . These products are typically employed to speed up the formation of new roots from a cutting . While cloning , in and of itself , may not be foreign to most of The EVOLUTION Magazine readers , I often find many people , even those who use rooting hormones today , aren ’ t quite as familiar with their function in cannabis propagation . So , what are rooting hormones , and how do they work ?
Rooting Hormones : 101 Simply put , a rooting hormone is intended to increase the chances that your fresh cutting will develop roots and become its own independent plant . When you cut a piece of stem from a plant and place it in a grow medium , you are essentially asking the cells within the base of that cutting to stop the process of vegetative growth and revert to producing roots . Without those roots , the cutting would have serious difficulty taking up nutrients and growing to maturity .
Changing how cells operate within your plant is a big ask , which is where rooting hormones come into play . Their function is to help ease the transition from vegetative growth to root growth by stimulating cells within the plant through the introduction of specific chemical ingredients .
Chemical Compounds There are two primary chemical compounds found in the majority of commercially available rooting hormones .
Indole-3-butyric acid ( C12H13NO2 for you chemists ), or IBA , is a plant hormone occurring naturally in willow trees and is the most popular ingredient in horticultural rooting products . In its pure form , IBA is a solid crystalline powder . When diluted down , it can also be mixed into liquids and gels .
NAA or 1-Naphthaleneacetic ― ( C10H7CH2CO2H ) is a completely synthetic plant hormone not found in nature . It assists in root development like IBA but has some