Thanks for this. This is my very first medical grow, I just started week 4 of flower and my 4 x 4 tent is so full. I so want to prune leafs off them. Like everybody else I have read and read and I just don't know what to do. I have some nice buds starting and I think I could have more if I pruned some leafs but there are so many that say "No" that I haven't removed any. The tent is so full that when I move them to check levels some fall off and I see so many branch's down low that will never produce anything, but I have left them alone. So I am very interested in this. Thank You
part of the reason I am doing this is I believe getting light through the canopy to the lower branches is a necessary. otherwise you might as well cut those off. when you grow au naturel, usually the plants are spaced out a bit and light enters thru the side as the sun passes overhead, hitting the plant at different angles as the day passes. that's why ppl use light movers indoors. because I scrog, which means I use a trellis, the idea is to have all the branches receiving the same amount of light. a grower prunes everything that doesn't make it to the scrog. I was told to give the lower branches until week four. if they haven't made it to the trellis/canopy by then, they get chopped/pruned to allow the plant to send that energy to the growing tips or lateral meristems.
if you have too many plants in too small a space, they crowd each other. this blocks air movement which means humidity builds up within the plants and you run the issue of mildew. in my humble opinion, you starve lower branches and buds of the light energy they need as well.