Why are people against pruning?

[grassott]

I aint sayin nuffin. Ima gonna let my pics do the talking...

Just 3 and a half days after defoli and the leaves are growing back from my "massacre". I'm just experimenting in my garden to see if this works. After the results I've seen in Hempy's garden I just had to give it a shot.

*DISCLAIMER* DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING. ALSO, DO NOT DO THIS IF YOUR PLANTS ARE ALREADY IN FLOWER. THIS MUST BE STARTED IN THE VEGGY STAGE. DOING THIS IN FLOWER COULD SERIOUSLY FUCK UP YOUR CROP!"

This is advice given by a person who does this religiously.

 

[CannabisDog]

I kind of think of trimming that may leaves off is like cutting your thumb and two fingers off, you can still get work done, just not as fast as you could have with them.

 

[grassott]

Even if they could why would you do it in the first place...[/B]

Reasons why I'm trying it....

1. This is an experiment, which I intend to share with other growers.
2. A non defoliated garden can get very crowded. This in turn will increase humidity and restrict air going throughout the canopy.
3. Research has shown me that defoliation promotes the growth of more budsites. I used to like the look of 9 fat fingered leaves, but on my white rhino indicas, these leaves would block out light to the lower/inner budsites, thus giving me airy popcorn buds. I don't like popcorn even if you sprinkle salt or sugar on it.
4.

A defoliated plant. When I saw this I almost jizz'd my pants.
5. I'm not a "Steady Eddie". The most successful people take the biggest risks in life.
6. Its fun. I find chopping leaves off kinda therapeutic.
7. The structure of a defol'd plant is MUCH better than the structure of a non-defol'd plant.

Need I go on?

 

[Marlo]

I'm definitely NOT a fan of stripping a plant of all its growth, such as you have grassot. I'd have to say, your plants don't seem to be enjoying it very much either.
The plants in your "before" picture don't look like they need trimming in my opinion. That is not what I consider a crowded room. There is plenty of space in there to spread the pots out rather than hack off all those leaves.


This is what i consider crowded...

I started trimming out of necessity. Not because some thread told me to.

 

[cheecha07]

I see a lot of people advising others to not prune off large, light blocking fan leafs. Just wondering why it is not advised?

Thank you!

I believe pruning large fan leaves end up weakening that branch and makes it much more likely to break during heavy winds/rain I also feel the buds become more leafy although I have yet to verify that.

 

[budlover123]

Why are people against pruning?

My best guess is that this is some sort of old trade secret that got released.

If only the naysayers would tell us what they know...

 

[one Q]

Grassott- your plants look great, I think your camera may suck tho. I agree with what youre saying about defol.

Marlo- you are a king among kings and a god among clowns.

Man, if a grower doesnt try new shit, then theyll be stuck. Being stuck is not a good place to be as a grower of ANYTHING. Any grower who reads these defol threads and doesnt try to do it PROPERLY on at least a few plants for a few grows is not a wise grower.

If you start with your mothers and seedlings, you;ll see how the plants respond and this will help you make smart defol choices in flower.

My pennies are shinny.

 

[Caspa420]

May i consider better air extraction for RH & "big colas" lmao u reckon? taking a few shades off that grows inwards i agree but stripping them back like that isn't beneficial imo only if you suck at getting good node space or you grow with with wank lights.

My first ever grow was 1m2, 1 x 400w, 1 x master kush clone, as my friend was in onit & he'd done a few crops by then, he stripped the plant of all leaf cept very tops, acouple times, it bushed out lovely & yielded 4 1/2oz.. myy next grow was exactly the same but minus the friend.. i didn't defoliate & was able to flip it 2 weeks earlier & i got 6oz off same quality herb.

Ego's suck, you suck, my mother sucks.

 

[Rowdy420]

I believe every one here is mistaking trimming the lower larf for a defoliation technique. Lolli-poping your buds by eliminating the "suckers" from the bottom of the plant will push the auxins to the top and make nicer developed buds. That being said there is a big difference between defoliating and lolli-poping. Leave the leafs alone Foo! The leafs will tell you when their usefulness has come to an end. Run what ya brung.

Good luck, Peace

 

[Marick23]

I don't like to bring politics into a ganja forum, but Americans (I'm English by the way for people who don't know me) wake up and smell the coffee. The Chinese are going all out war at bettering themselves at the moment, which is why, IMHO, their economy is exceeding yours. Them Chinese folks got balls of steel. They would never better themselves without experimentation and if they listened to negativity they'd be fucked! IMHO. Think about it

Now I am not in anyones posse. Grass congrats on being English. The chinese economy has nothing to do with balls. In point of fact with the Chinese they've had nothing but negativity throughout their history. Part of that hole communist thing you know. They also have little to no epa regulations protecting the country from poisons. Last but not least. Todays "world" economy is "consumer" driven. Largest population equals largest peice of the pie.


To the OP the reason that I am against defoliation is; Your fan leaves are your emergency response teams.

If you miss a plant in watering and she starts to dry out. The fan leaves dry up and shrivel giving what water it has to the plant so that it may survive.

If you miscalculated your nutes leaving your plant deficient. The fan leaves are the first ones to happily give up it's nutrient so the rest of the plant may live.


When you defoliate you take away your emergency response team. When your system is dialed and you are familiar with your strain. Then defoliating is less of a gamble.

 

[ReelBusy1]

I see what you're driving at bro but we're not talking about a solar battery. I seem to get a better yield when I start removing large fan leafs early in flowering.

Key word "seem"

FYI, A plant is a solar battery.

 

[grassott]

Key word "seem"

FYI, A plant is a solar battery.

A plant is a solar battery? Does a solar battery have leaves that grow back within days after you cut them off?

 

[noreason]

A plant is a solar battery? Does a solar battery have leaves that grow back within days after you cut them off?

if you intend to compare a plant and a solar battery, you should consider that:

plant produce leaves

man produce solar battery

If a plant can grow back leaves, a man can replace solar panels

In both cases there is work,thus energy expended to replace leaves\panels.

This energy has a cost in both cases,energy that could be spent to do other things, if leaves\panel work as they should.


Whit this I'm far away from tell that defoliating doesn't work, I just prefer to don't cut leaves if there is no real necessity, and I like to see bushy plants btw.
Am I lazy? I don't think, I keep experiment other things.

Keep politics out and peace in people

 

[ColoradoOG]

There is a million and one ways to grow and to each his own..There are to many variables to pin point "the way" but saying you enjoy positive critisism and then resort to name calling is a bit uncalled for. Did it solve anything? Good luck with your experiment as every grower needs to find his own way..Tht is what growers do but a man who states he is about positive critisism should not fall victimand resort to name calling.. It shows you are no better than the one that insulted you.

 

[FRIENDinDEED]

defoliate, defoliate, defoliate!!!

defoliate, defoliate, defoliate!!!

this is what one of my favorite plants looks like now. . .

this is what it looked like before. . .

and all the while i was taking those big main stem fan leaves off the taller it got.

like someone else said solar panels dont grow back, but leaves do!! whatever you take off of your plant the other parts will pick up the slack.

if there are other variables that a grower isnt mentioning or just isnt being out right about then thats on their garden, but the proof is out there and this is a technique thats been used time and time again.

defoliate, defloliate, defoliate!!! and doo it as early as possible! these are my moms before . . .

i havent gotten to the two in the back yet but after some topping and defoliating. . .

start em out young, especially the ones youve got in veg that your gonna eventually flower, IMO defoliate the shit outta them and then when its time to flower all your gonna have left is bud sites, and you can defoliate all they way through, IMO up until 3 weeks before harvest.

let those budsites at the bottom get that light so you dont have to deal with popcorn buds

 

[FreezerBoy]

Enough with the bickering. Make me turn this thing around and no ice cream for anyone...

 

[JWP]

Some peope might think that i'm against pruning. Its not true rather i'm pro logic and pro maximum yield.

When the goal is maximum yield in the least amount of time and the plant is small say under a pound the battery analogy is correct.

If you cut off any green you loose its that simple. If a leaf browns and falls off by itself thats different, the energy is not taken from the plant.

Remember the 6 P's...
Prior Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance

Use flowering clones for maximum yield except in a SOG.

I can think of a million reasons to prune but maximising yield is certainly not one of them.

 

[Phaeton]

I did the defoliate for the last 13 years, sometimes trim more, sometimes trim less, but every plant got fan leaves pulled. They did their job, started the node, now time to go. The plants get ugly quick, I did not forget to trim.

I have a test budroom, lighting tests mostly, with control plants.
When tests don't have good results I kiss the equipment costs goodbye. Lost $500 on violet, the current UVB test just went past $800, and the test room is always going, new lights every two months. It stays empty just long enough to reconfigure.
Not to talk commerce, but these tests have to be paid for. So far the successful testing changes have paid for finding out what doesn't work.

I no longer defoliate my plants, after 13 years I now do it different. Serendipity from a light test.

The compensation from the change is positive. This is my day job, so less grow is less food on the table, that is motivation not to do silly things on hearsay or habit.

 

[grassott]

I'm happy to say that some of my posts have been removed from this thread. Some people made me act out of character.

I apologise to the staff at ICMag and also to the original poster. I also apologise to anybody that may have been offended by my remarks. Thank you.

 

[mad librettist]

I see a bunch of issues here. People are talking at each other. Here are some observations:

Overhead Indoor lighting does not penetrate like the sun
if a plant is pruned early in life, it will need pruning forever
Not all budsites are created equal
Old or nonproductive fan leaves usually get cannibalized for resources
Non-productive budsites don't wither and die, they just keep sucking energy


So what I do is start with budsite selection. I like a budsite stem to be connected to the central stalk.
after selecting budsites I begin culling
when I remove budsites, I sometimes leave the fan leaves
the remaining budsites tend to have the right amount of leaf


With proper budsite selection I eliminate the need for defoliation, and I avoid the wasted time recovering from heavy pruning. If I don't have too many budsites, I probably don't have too many leaves.


As for some of the pics in here of very young or small plants being defoliated, I agree the plants look great before, not so good after. Further, the plants "before" defoliation don't seem to have crowding or airflow issues. In fact, the specimen is perfectly structured to make the most of the available light. If all goes well the plants recover but when you stress them they are more disease and pest prone, just like you. If the defoliated plants looked healthy and vigorous, the practice might be more appealing. But what I see is a whole lot of wasted space that used to have leaves collecting energy without causing problems lower down. Plus, those lower buds are far from the light. In my garden those lower budsites would be culled in favor of growth closer to my light. IMO it takes as much energy to make popcorn as it does to make nice buds. And I don't mean per unit of measure, I mean that to make that little popcorn bud, you are using the same energy it would have takes to make a real bud.


some notes on perception:

if you shave your pubes your johnson looks bigger; a plant with fewer leaves looks like it has more bud
people almost never start a thread about how they got great results from leaving things alone
people tend to think they are successful or fail because of something they did consciously and actively
people don't tend to start threads about techniques that don't lead to failure but don't help either, even though the bulk of actual experience may reflect just that. There is not much motivation to start a thread about something not very helpful or very unhelpful.
People will also tend to only notice what they want to notice. If increased incidence of disease occurs in defoliated gardens, no one who is defoliating is likely to notice - pest resistance isn't mentioned in any pro-defoliation thread I have seen, nor is any other concern beyond what happens to the plant in terms of structure.