Mike took the time to work with the girls, it was difficult to get them out of bed sometimes but overall they got into the spirit when they saw how devoted Mike was to his craft at this stage in the City's development. As he put his pants on in the morning, he couldn't even count the feet that were poking out of the pile of naked women in his bed. 'These girls need a better way to vent their pent up energies.'
They ate breakfast and then went directly into the classroom.
"Today we're going to talk about Clones. Maybe you know what a clone is, maybe you don't.. but a clone is a copy. A Duplicate of the original, usually made from pieces of the whole. With the plants, most plants that grow like this, you can make clones. This saves a few weeks time during seed germination and it also allows you to propagate a lot of a particular plant. What if you planted 1000 seeds, what would you have? You'd have a lot of plants but what else?" Mike gave them a chance to answer.
"You'd have a bunch of different plants?" Jodi was the first to answer, she had been reading ahead in the Sahgro Manual. The book was about growing and it had been handwritten then copied a few dozen times by the printer down the road.
"That's half right. Each Cannabis plant is different, even if they are the same strain they are like children, if you have a thousand children, how many of them do you expect to look exactly alike? Maybe a handful look closely alike but there are small differences and how they grow or where they live will shape them as people. The same can be said for plants, eventually I'll talk about monster cropping, super cropping and fimming. I've been experimenting with a lot of different substances but the best I can get a hold of is Elemental Water." Mike let out a deep exhale, he had said a mouthful. "What's elemental water good for? We were just talking about it?"
"Clones?" March answered, she was trying to stay involved but her mind was easily elsewhere.
"Good. Yes, Clones. In order to get a plant to grow, it has to have roots. This is usually true, but, with cloning, you're cutting pieces off of the plant and putting them into a substance to make them develop roots. Not all plants do this but a lot of them do, just by placing them into moist soil or water, there is a small chance that roots will naturally develop without any additional help." Mike picked up a bottle from his desk.
"This is Concentrated Elemental Water, technically, its magical in origin but that doesn't matter, the result is the same if not slightly better than Cloning Gel." He brought a plant out of storage and set it on the floor, gently. "Each plant has many nodes. Nodes are the spaces between branches and they almost always have a spiral pattern as they ascend up and out. Internodal length that is further than 4 inches is just too far." Mike put his hand up and said "My hand is about 4 inches wide, if its able to fit, the plant is growing way too fast and can probably use better nutrients. Anyways, In the middle of each branch or node, there is a small elbow where a nub will form and eventually, another branch will begin to grow. These happen after a few weeks, usually after the plant is 3-5 weeks old."
A knife appeared in Mike's hand, it was thin, not as thin as he'd like it but still very thin. "Find the thinnest, sharpest knife, a razor would be great but I haven't found any good razors either. I'm a little surprised that there aren't more bearded people running around." Demonstrating on the wall, he drew a small clone and at the bottom of the drawing he exaggerated the 45° angle with a slash. "You want to cut at a forty-five degree angle, which is a down slash and away. You will also want to do it in a single motion, sawing the clone off isn't the right way to do it. Its not a log."
Opening the Bottle of Elemental Essence, he could smell the Concentrated Water. "Now, when you've taken your clone, the first thing you need to do, is put it into the cloning gel or the substance that will make roots, like this Essence. Usually you have to wait for roots to develop in order to plant them in the ground but I've decided to try hydroponically growing one of them in the essence as an experiment. Lets go take a look."
Mike brought the fresh clone with him and put the donor plant away to lead the girls out to the farmland. The rows of plants were all covered by individual shields and formations, it looked rather orderly and neat. Looking at the girls, he could see March still lost in thought. "March, what's going on? I don't see you paying attention, is everything okay?"
She looked up and pinged her fingertips together, she seemed nervous. "I like being with everyone but I don't like digging or working in the dirt." She stuck out her tongue at the other girls, they had been giving her a hard time for her disinterest in farming. "I'd rather be inside the Casino singing. Can I please go back to the Theater?" March jumped up and down like she was eager to hear an answer.
"I thought you were doing really good, even when you were not paying attention you still got all the answers right. Are you sure you'd rather be singing? That's a lot of work too ya know." Mike tried to think of a way to make her stay but her tail flicked from side to side and she seemed veryy happy.
"Mmhmm.. I love singing." March spun and started to run back to the Casino.
"Looks like we lost one." Vella made an observational comment, her gaze was on Mike's hands. She had never known about clones and the concept fascinated her.
"So It seems. March always did prefer to be inside, now that I think about it." Mike kept walking with the others and they made their way to a formation at the back.
"This is my Hydroponic setup. I have a bucket, a tube, a wind spell formation that blows bubbles into the water and the water has been replaced with elemental essence because, why not. This type of system is one of the most basic for hydroponics. The Cloning Gel would help make roots but eventually the roots would rot in the gel. The affects of the Elemental Essence are making spontaneous nucleosis." 'Hm... I don't have any mentos and cola, so.. how do I explain this...' Mike touched his chin and started to draw on the wall.
"Nucleolus is when one bubble will make bubbles on all sides and those bubbles will do the same thing, pushing themselves out and more bubbles will appear until the reaction stops. It happens usually, very, very fast. At least, that's what I remember from chemistry class." Mike laughed and touched his nose. "Okay, so, the water has to have bubbles in it why? Can anyone tell me?"
"If you're blowing wind, does that mean that the roots need it?" Jodi popped out a viable question, it made Mike happy to see her so interested. She was always the little one he was worried would end up picking up all the bad habits.
Mike nodded. "Yes. If there is no air or movement in the water, the water becomes stagnant. Still water is not good to drink, it rots things inside of it. Remember that, don't drink out of stagnant water. If it doesn't flow, that's a no. Just like how your plants need to stay healthy, so do you. Clones can get sick, just like the regular plants. If I take any of these plants and put it into the same type of formation, they would be growing very fast and healthy but if the water wasn't moving they would die in a matter of hours maybe."
"Hydroponics is unforgiving, because you're skipping things the plant normally requires. When you skip the details, sometimes things go wrong." Mike looked to see if everyone understood, he walked to the formation that was sitting next to the one they were just discussing. "This formation over here houses a Sea of Green setup. I can put a hundred clones in one bucket on a sled and put them directly into flower or to make seeds. I actually like this method but it requires a lot of prep work and a Mother Plant Garden."
"You were just explaining earlier about mother plants." Vella twirled a pen in her hand, she was taking notes on cloning, seeing her in serious mode sort of gave Mike a more favorable impression of her.
"I was. But then explaining that one big plant can make a hundred plants, or even a thousand over time can be difficult. The Mother plants live in perpetual light and never go to sleep, we call them Mother Plants because they give us clones and can live forever, theoretically. Since all plants are slightly different, like people, that means each plant will be different but if you find one you really like, you try to keep it healthy, safe, isolated, alive and making more clones."
Vella couldn't help but share her thoughts again. "So you can have more of that plant? Like a sort of genetic reincarnation, a doppelganger of sorts or perhaps maybe even twin spirits can be born?"
"Genetic reincarnation? That's a cool thought but no.. just copies. If the plants had a soul, I think the soul would also be cloned, because the plant will become an exact copy over time. If you planted one of their seeds, like I said before, the next plant will be different." Mike shook his head and set the newly cut clone into the Sea of Green raft. Small cups with tiny paper-like tines held the plant in place atop the floating raft, a wind formation blew bubbles and circulated the water. "Clones normally have a viability issue and there is a problem with roots developing from a cut. Unsanitary conditions, like one where mold or mildew is present, could kill the clone easily. Its important to wash your hands regularly and to be decisive in your cuts."
"Why don't we grow other plants?" Vella's inquisitive nature was on fire, she kept asking questions. "The city's food reserves are not bare but if we had fresh vegetables, with us being such a huge port we could have lots more business."
Mike agreed, "That's not a bad attitude, but who would farm it? March was a good example, she really didn't want to get dirty. This sort of attitude toward farming has been the downfall of entire civilizations, everybody's gotta eat." His hands went up, "I can't do all the work either." He considered waking up the Sleeping subordinates again but shook the thought from his mind, he had enough on his plate just training the first batch of the Casino workers.
If they were unable to find long term farmers, then the farm would just be a prop.