How aggressive do you get with pruning, training, topping?

[madalasatori]

I err on the side of not pruning now after I pruned the bottom quarter of my last crop two weeks into flower, cost me 50% in yield

 

[resinryder]

urine..diluted in water at 1:10 lol

I can help you with that but you gotta catch it! Price to be paid for everything these days. lol

 

[sweetestsin420]

haha nastyyy^^lol,i dont think id ever do that haha,rather get some miraclegrow lol

 

[St3ve]

it all depends on how much time I have to veg. Any topping or de-leafing stresses and slows the growth so I'm careful not to cost myself a full canopy by the end of stretch.

If I have plenty of veg time, I absolutely do. I usually only top once when they are little. Then I aggressively defoliate once a week. This keeps the node spacing much tighter and helps control the plants growing into each other and causing even more stretch. It also pushes out tons more budsites.

Then at one week prior to flip, I take clones off the lower branches and prune off any suckers and low light branches. Then they recover for one week and the flip. Then I don't touch* until again till after stretch. After stretch I nip off any sucker branches that may have appeared and big fans that are shading. Then throughout the remainder of flower I only nip oversized fans.

*the only time that I will mess with them during stretch is if there are some shoots or tops that are getting outta control. For those I will supercrop (pinch) or defoliate the shoot to stunt it a little.

 

[3thirteen]

I would agree with SSO. I found that when i would take off leaves my harvest were less than when i would just let them go. I think the plant works to produce bigger leaves rather than bigger flowers.

 

[sweetestsin420]

i also think it depends on the strain,and how the buds form..some strains have huge,top colas,while some (og's,bubba kush,trainwreck) have alot of smallish round chunky buds,and theyr all viney and floppy,i think the latter would benefit from cutting off big fan leaves,

 

[Bud Spleefman]

i also think it depends on the strain,and how the buds form..some strains have huge,top colas,while some (og's,bubba kush,trainwreck) have alot of smallish round chunky buds,and theyr all viney and floppy,i think the latter would benefit from cutting off big fan leaves,

I agree with most of what you are saying except the part about the fan leaves. The fan leaves are where photosynthesis occurs, so fan leave, themsleves, are not bad. However, branching, in general (think of a Christmas Tree's lower branches) rob energy from a plant, and just don't get enough light to make decent bud. So, if you want more energy for the top of a plant, you can cut off the lower branches and send energy higher up, forming better tops/kolas. This technique is called "Lolipoping" where you make a plant have the shape of a large lolipop. the OP was asking about that, and that, as we said, is strain dependant, as to how much of the top to cut. Irregardless of that, you should always cut the bottom third of the branches, they don't get enough light to make decent buds, regardless of what your strategy is for for the tops.

 

[St3ve]

@3thirteen: When you found that you got a reduced yield from taking leaves off.. when did you do it? I'm asking because if you just take some leaves off in flower then I would definitely agree. However, if you start removing them at a early time in veg, and keep doing it, it creates a much more compact plant with more branches and budsites by the time you hit flower.

@bud: When the fans get large in veg, it tends to shade and cause leggy plants. Have you experimented with plucking leaves?

 

[Arminius]

it all depends on how much time I have to veg. Any topping or de-leafing stresses and slows the growth so I'm careful not to cost myself a full canopy by the end of stretch.

If I have plenty of veg time, I absolutely do. I usually only top once when they are little. Then I aggressively defoliate once a week. This keeps the node spacing much tighter and helps control the plants growing into each other and causing even more stretch. It also pushes out tons more budsites.

Then at one week prior to flip, I take clones off the lower branches and prune off any suckers and low light branches. Then they recover for one week and the flip. Then I don't touch* until again till after stretch. After stretch I nip off any sucker branches that may have appeared and big fans that are shading. Then throughout the remainder of flower I only nip oversized fans.

*the only time that I will mess with them during stretch is if there are some shoots or tops that are getting outta control. For those I will supercrop (pinch) or defoliate the shoot to stunt it a little.

This is exactly what I do. Knowing when stretch is over is huge. 40% of the 12/12 cycle will be stretch.
I start by taking the largest fans at the base of the laterals, then over the remaining 60% of the cycle I will slowly take the rest...