yeah, get a photo up, thats too many variables witout lookin'.

yeah that's weird - it sounds like "re-greened". I did that once regrowing the crop after harvesting most of it and it took almost a month for the leaves to go from three to seven. But as plants mature well into flowering they loose leaf so if it is in flowering that is normal some strains more than others but reduction in leaflets is a sign of maturation.
Also, could be light is not strong enough from the other things you say about it, think stem and all?

I like Flint's foam idea it would really keep the cloning gel around the stem and that's got to help. I like to shave off very carefully the outermost layer of skin along the bottom inch to inch and a half of clone stems also before dipping them. I think it helps them get their feet a little quicker.

I've said before though that I wouldn't just grow like one plant and start taking clones off of it in any kind of commercial business. I have done that for my own grows, though. At the very least grow out about twenty seeds of the strain you are looking for and at least pull the heartiest grower although this is not a sure sign of how good the smoke is? I would take like the five heartiest growers and take clones from each one then grow them out, keeping track of which goes with which of course, Then make a decision upon which to crown as my mother clone based upon how it grew, yielded, etc and most especially how it smoked.

Do that with like fifty or a hundred and pick the best, you'll be growing about as pro as you can - that's how you come up with something special. Even these really stable strains will show genetic variance and that is where the growers discretion comes in. Kind of like computers, quality in, quality out. Shit in, shit out.