Sometimes, it takes a fellow grower.

The importance of conversation.

Dear Friend & Subscriber-

This past week, I was reminded of why it's important to make time for conversations.

True conversations. Not small talk. But actual back-and-forth, in-pursuit-of-a-common-goal conversations with people who share your path, past, present, or future.

A friend of mine in another state called me the other day after learning of some trouble I was having with my cloner.

A bit of background: this individual is a new friend but a longtime grower, someone with easily 10x the years of experience that I have. And, come to find out, he clones using a similar setup to what I'm using.

The main difference: he's getting 90-100% success rate with 2-3 cuttings per site!

"Take everything with a grain of salt," as they say.

This approach to everything, and specifically cannabis, is important, but also myopic.

What works for others may not work for you, and adjusting your entire system each time you get a new piece of advice does not make sense. At the same time, repeatedly forcing a round peg into a square hole because you won't listen to what others have to say also makes no sense.

As much as I try to be open to advice, occasionally, I find myself closed off to suggestions.

You may recognize this feeling, too. Symptoms include:

• Preemptively defending yourself

• Rapid-fire regurgitation of everything you think you're doing right

• Regular assertions of having "tried everything" but nothing worked

• Acknowledgment of an issue while repeating the same process

It's natural to be defensive when your methods are being called into question; no one wants to be "wrong."

In the grow, it isn't about being right or wrong; it's about what works. There are crazy methods that make no sense for anyone but a single grower, but, if that grower is happy with the results, then it "worked". With that said, there are general guidelines, and, in pursuit of trying to fix an issue, we often overlook what's right in front of us.

When this friend called to chat about cloning, I was already on the defensive.

It's hard to admit shortcomings. Especially to people who are more experienced than yourself. But doing so gives us room to grow (no pun intended).

I rattled off all of my numbers with a confidence that did not match my success rates.

Cloning is a science. Finding what works for you takes time. And, as someone who has tried a variety of methods (aloe + honey, peat plugs, rockwool cubes, soil, organic and inorganic, aerocloning, etc.), I can tell you that it is easy to get lost in the details.