Hello all, long time lurker, first time poster. Well I'm relatively new to this game, I had two grows I messed up by using miracle grow and a normal feeding schedule and am on a third that is going pretty good with a coco fiber and perlite/vermiculite mix and "Flora Nova" grow and bloom nutrients, cal-mag, Superthrive, Hygrozyme, Mykos in the soil, some mollasses, and Clear-ex to flush. PH is about 6.0, room temp is about 75 degrees and relatively dry, two small fans blowing air and another fan venting in from a taped off side entrance. 15 Indica dominant hybrids under a 1000 watt interchangable MH/HPS. Now, according to my calender I have about a week left until 8 weeks of flowering has passed, and according to a chart in one of my books they look like they have another week or two to go (I'm thinking staggered harvest because the tops look a lot more "done"). So here's the reason I'm posting... On this forum and others I've noticed there is great debate between the idea of aggressively removing any excess leaves to "expose more light to the bud sites", and the idea that all leaves should be left on because "it provides more energy to the plant like solar panels". I've seen beautiful looking buds before on a plant that had a bunch of yellow and droopy leaves hanging off, but I've also seen pictures of nice looking buds where all the leaves were pulled off except the ones with the tips sticking out of the bud. My friend who trims outdoor plants for a company came up to take a look at my plants and advised me on taking the former approach as I had been using the "leave it" method. I figured I have about a week left in flowering so why not, these early grows are an experiment anyways. Now the buds definitely have that "magazine" look, so I'm thinking I did the right thing, but am still a little confused because of all the people on the forums saying "don't pull leaves". I think next grow I'm going to do half plants aggressively pruned and half left "all natural", then I'll weigh the harvest from each to see which way works better. Any thoughts?
if i can pull them off without much force they go if a big fan leaf is covering up a great bud site it goes otherwise they stay.
This is something i've been waiting to find an answer too as well. A lot of people say that you can just move the fan leaves aside via lst , and expose the bud sites, then thats good enough, no cutting required. Others say yeah but if you take down the leaves, the plant doesnt have to spend energy keeping them alive and has more energy for bud growth. I'd love to see a side by side of these two strategies using clones. If cutting them only produced a small yield increase i probably wouldn't do it. I love my girls too much to cut on them for a minimal gain....a moderate gain however....
Yeah, there is already a thread about this.... But I'll give you my $0.02 I never pull leafs unless they are touching the soil...If it's in the way of a budsite, I can easily bend the big leafs out of the way... The main sun leafs act as "solar panels" so I wouldn't want to remove my "power source" EDIT: It's all about what the individual grower feels comfortable with...
Taking leaves from my plants have helped get light to budz but I took way too many "15%" of leaves once and it shocked the shit out of plants for a while due to losing its moisture leaves. Out west they take many leaves off in the outdoor because its so freaking moldy out there.
personally i have done side by side comparison with the same strain under the same conditions. one i pulled a shit load of leaves off and the other i did not. the plant i took all the leaves from was a lot slower developing almost as if the plant was about a month behind the other. the plant that i did not remove any leaves on got very fat and dense very quickly. in the very long run after dry and cure i had almost a half oz less in dry weight with the plant i trimmed a lot of leaves off. So after doing my own experiments i say it is better to leave it bushy unless the leave is more then 50 % dead leave it alone.
Duuuuude Kush i dig your sig! what an overly complex way of saying that everything that lives must die.
how come in High Times the bud shots all have the leaves trimmed off though? The buds are nice and fat looking so they can't all be newb growers.
i think the answer is that if you do it exactly properly, then you'll have better results than if you didn't... but if you take off the wrong leaves, or too many, then it will be detrimental to your plants' health. I'd probably just leave it alone, only trimming dead leaves, unless there's a bud sight that is completely in the dark.
Can of worms is exactly right good luck getting one answer more then another. I cut a leaf if its easy to pull or getting pretty yellow. Otherwise i run a string through and start tying leaves back towards the main stem or other directions. I try to leave everything on the plant.
This really is the answer. It can be easy to overdo it. I'm pretty sure I did it with my current grow. Its a fine line you gotta ride.
Defoliate fan leaves after substantial flowering occurs. I do it in week 5. More light penetration and better air circulation. It allows flowers on the lowest part of the plant to mature more evenly. It causes minor stress for a short time, and then the plant takes off just in time to finish strong. I believe that changing the plant to rootmass ratio delivers more nutrients to the flower sites then if the plant was left alone.
Look at a few of mine...no leaves trimmed, no photoshop, just took from tent for sec and shot picture a couple runs ago....all organic in soil. ONLY at the last couple weeks I pull ALL fan leaves and colas get giant.
...btw, I am new at this...only my first year. I have my card through California. With the right advice you can have beautiful crops, but on the same token bad advice will waste time, money, and sanity.