Mainlining and defoliation

Your plant looks very healthy. Unless you deal with high humidity in your area I'd leave them just as they are. If you deal with high humidity I would remove the largest fan leaves to open up the plant for better air flow. I'm guessing with your IPM of only insecticidal soap you do not have an issue with caterpillars. If you really wanted you could defoliate as you wanted. It will just impact your yield in both bud size and quantity. I grew a few test plants outdoors last year using mainline training and several with no training. There is really no benefit to mainlining outdoors other than a lower height. I do mainline most of my plants indoors, as I grow in tents.

 

Did you do a proper mainline?

 

I use that augmented mainline technique in my small 2x2 tents. What MickFoster posted is how an actual 8 top mainline should look.

 

@MickFoster is there a guide here on GC? I want to try this.

 

This is the tutorial that I followed.
Main-Lining Tutorial on Training Marijuana Plants | Grow Weed Easy

 

I respectfully disagree with you 100%

Manipulating is key to outdoor growing... AAA flower.

 

@Growtogrow I didn't realize that you mainlined and or manifold trained your plants. I thought you manipulated them and defoliated them. I do agree that proper training can increase the "quality" of your bud. I do not believe it will increase the quantity of bud in outdoor plants. I'd be very interested in you proving me wrong with a side by side grow.
BTW. You grow some beautiful and huge plants. I do respect your opinion.

 

Yes I've mainline outside before. I ran a blueberry cookies from Dinafem.

I don't practice mainline or manifolding too much these days.
I really don't have the time. And I work with a lot of plants.

But I'm not saying that I wouldn't do it and I'm not saying that I am not up for the challenge with you to do it.

But A little late in the summertime this year. but if you want to do it next year. " I'm your huckleberry " ( friend.) No problem you know me I'm always up for it. 100% LoL it'd be fun and I have just a strain for it.
In fact I'm working with it right now the skunk hero from Jean'Os genetics.

Hey Tim...
I thought, I understood you to say in your post above that plant manipulation outside is futile. Sorry if I misunderstood you. But it did sound that way.

That's how I took your post above friend. And I know you have followed me for years and I was going to say something to that effect but I erased it and just put in what I put.

So with that being said you know exactly how I feel about any type of plant manipulation outside.

I'm a 100% believer in manipulation inside or outside doesn't matter where. And all techniques are viable some are better than others but they're all viable outside or inside.

These are pics from the last time that I actually practiced mainlining or manifolding. It's a lot of work to make that happen. I just don't have the time to do that all the time with every plant. A smaller crop is no problem. This particular summer that I ran this one like this was a two crops summer for me and this was done in the first crop of 2020 outside summer grow using light deprivation techniques.


Dinafem Blueberry cookies outside 2020 practice manifolding.


Some of the pics showed through I just punch him all in these days in hopes that some of them will show up. As this forum and sight seems to be really hardcore on trying to load up pictures these days.? Maybe with the thread administrator on here he can figure out why we don't have very good load up on this site any longer? we've been dealing with this for about six or seven months now.

 

I have real issues with mold in my area too. We have a large stream on the east border of our property and a small one on our west side. We also have 2 ponds. I live in a dead end hollow so there isn't great air flow. That was my reason for trying outdoor mainlines last year. I spray my plants weekly with Potassium bicarbonate. It changes the leaf surface pH making it an undesirable location for mold spores to attach. It works very well for me. I strip my plants of most of their inside branches and also their lower foliage. All to provide better airflow and I don't like trimming larfy bud. Here are a few pictures of a 10 gallon mainlined plant and a 20 gallon mainlined plant. They are both Blueberry Snowdream by DiamondNugz.

 

I would luv to try some 10-20 gal pots but my indoor 1/2 bathroom it's just not practical imo, how much water do those use? I carry my own water & use app 30 gal/week for 4-6 plants in 5gal of soil in a sorta sip type grow. I need some cheap plastic outer pots to put my grow bags into, now the bags sit on top of lava rocks inside a saucer. I'd like to try sips for my pineapple plants as well.

 

Watering varies greatly depending on our environment. I run 10 gallon fabric pots inside of 10 gallon plastic pots and they sit in saucers. They generally run under 135 watts of QB boards for each plant. They tend to use 1/2-3/4 of a gallon every 3-4 days.

 

You guys/gals Have been giving me some great ideas, sips, mainlining, lst, various training methods, defoliation, manipulation etc. STILL in early stages of throwing everything on the wall & seeing what sticks & using this and that with + results, only 3 years now. Thank you. I think I manipulate or defoliate something whenever I go into the grow room.

 

I'll drink to those results!