Defoliation during flowering

T macc said:

You can defoliate the first day of flower or the day before. This will slow down the stretch some. And I do like to defoliate and prune at week 3 to allow lower buds a chance to get fatter. Some say this lowers yield, some say it the same. Experiment.

You can also supercrop too-tall branches during stretch. I prefer not to go this route, but it works. Best thing is to get your canopy right during veg

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My present experiment: 9 plants in a 4X4 under a 1000 HPS. None topped ( I discovered I’m literally OCD or indoctrinated to topping 3 times and supercropping) and the taller ones supercropped. 2 multiple times. All in 3 gallon grow bags. Using Lucas formula exclusively. I pruned the lowers yesterday but the leaves do not need thinning. By totally eliminating the Grow except for the first 2 feedings after flip I don’t have excess leafiness. My plants are obviously tall enough to require supercropping and the supercropping has allowed some of the side shoots to reach almost as high as the canopy. Removing leaves that a plant has grown for a reason is not recommended. Try using less nitrogen overall.

Thundercat said:

I'm not a fan of heavy defoliation btw. Doing some selective pruning and removing a few leaves that block areas is great. I even will remove a few of the lowest bud sites to encourage upward growth. I've never seen great results from heavy leaf removal.

The different side by side tests I've done with identical clones in the same environment have never shown significant benefit to "defoliation".

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I’m just gonna practice not defoliating...if I can help it.. I totally took the solar panels away.. and paying for it now... lesson learned... I’ll just top and train.. I have more vertical height than width...