Hi, first grow, im growing barneys farm critical kush. got 6 going, all got several nodes . 1 out of my 6 plants topped itself naturally occurring after its first true leaf/node which is cool because I want to train my plants and make them bushy with alot of shoots because i have a 3.5x4 grow space that im setting a screen on for scrog. I've never topped or FIM'd, but I could imagine I could handle topping a plant because it seems easy enough but if I can make more than 2 new growth chutes and get 4 instead id much rather learn how to FIM. From hours of research seeing there isn't a whole lot on FIMing, i see that alot of guides cut their small shade leaves in their FIM top, i dont see the point in this because ur leaves will grow out to be warped and mangled once they grow out. so if i spread all of my new grow leaves apart, can i cut the center stem out without cutting my leaves? so from what i see on my plants growing... my 2 newest leaves directly in the center of a plant, pretty much look like the base of the top? is topping only pulling the top 2 newest leaves off? is fimming cutting below the newest 2 leaves, so that my cut afterwards looks like the center stem got cut flat on the top? so i uploaded a pic, is this black line about where i should cut it across to fim? should the cut be below the top leaves and cutting across the main stem? is it necessary to cut the leaves with the cut to FIM? could i spread them apart and cut only the stem out? if all else fails, i can just at least top them though normally, i just need more top buds for scrog. to top though is removing 'all' of the very top growth from the newest 2 top nodes above correct? so i would pull off entirely the newest 2 leaves and the peice of stem with it thats above the the newest highest 2 nodes?
I would remove the third set of leaves and give it a week, your plant will have 4-6 main tops you need to have plant growing just like yours to pull this off