Thining out the leaves??

Hey everyone couple of quick questions here? im growing two different strains a sativa dominant and indica dominant the sativa dominant believe it or not is a 7 weeker that's just what i have been told the person who gave it to me is a dipshit so im expecting 9 i have yet too see a 7 week sativa dominant plant but anyway lol. I am expecting different answers, but i just want to see what most peeps think. so there in week 4 and its a god damned jungle should i thin them out or is that just poppycock they have some really good looking tops and secondary buds the sativa dominant do but everything under the secondary buds is shrimps!! and the indica stuff it looks like a big bushy fucker i don't really know if its needs any attention?

I've never been a fan of trimming leaves, but some gear requires it for max lower bud size

Wait until buds form, then remove only the leaves that are directly on top of them...or close enough to block the majority of light.

And pics would help, good-luck!

I would just trim the lower fan leaves to get light to them extra nodes down there so they can grow well

Ya I've been wondering this cause I'm in veg and some of the lower branches seem to be getting blocked of all light by a couple fan leaves, and the branches seem to be trying to grow around it, kinda seems like a natural bonsai tree... Lol just wondering if I should cut some of these fan leaves off even though I have a couple weeks of vegging left to let the lower growth get some more light.

I trim fan leaves any time it is in the way and can't simply be moved. First week of flower I always cut of all weak lower branches that will never attain canopy height as well. It's sort-of an executive decision you have to make. I ask myself: "Will this branch/leaf harm bud production somewhere else if allowed to live?" Or, "Do I want the plant focusing its growth effort toward this branch or is it better spent elsewhere?" Likewise: "Will losing this leaf cause the plant to lack nutrients?

TheDuder said:

I trim fan leaves any time it is in the way and can't simply be moved. First week of flower I always cut of all weak lower branches that will never attain canopy height as well. It's sort-of an executive decision you have to make. I ask myself: "Will this branch/leaf harm bud production somewhere else if allowed to live?" Or, "Do I want the plant focusing its growth effort toward this branch or is it better spent elsewhere?" Likewise: "Will losing this leaf cause the plant to lack nutrients?

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couldn't agree more with this. I have done experiments with leaving everything and trimming the bottom growth. I found that leaving everything results in more but smaller buds. So now top them and form 4 main branches and then bend them back. so the lower nodes will grow up faster. I let everything stay on during veg then when I put them into flowering. I trim the branches between 1/4 and 1/2 and take these for clones. I found this to be the best of both worlds or at least what works for me.

By waiting to trim until week one of flower, you can also determine sex so you can take clones from a female. I start from fem seed, which doesn't require that though. I'm sure you'll agree, week 1 of flower I trim about a grocery bag full of lower branch and leave trimmings. It's like a haircut. My girls always love having their "dead ends" cut off.
Here are some pics of my current grow. I am 10 days in flower on 2 old mothers and trimmed a week ago. Here is a before and after...

-Dude

See uncle ben's post on this rather than listening to these folks.....fan leaves are the solar panela, remove them and its like taking cylinders out of your cars engine.

The only time I like to cut fan leaves back is when cloning. Even then only cutting the leaf in half.

A plant needs leaves for Photosynthesis. That last statement is a fact plain and simple.

Now if you are doing a Scrog, spreading the canopy out you have the foresight to know that there will be NO light to the lower leaves. Therefore it seems to make sense to cut those leaves as soon as light becomes unavailable to that particular leaf.

Don't have to listen to me. Or discredit me. My method has worked for many a grow. Do what works for you. I have personally never noticed a slowing or decrease in yield from my trimming. I am firm on trimming in bulk though. Meaning, if you have some things to cut, do it all at once and then leave them alone. There is little need for much trimming during veg. I usually top the plant in veg and then in week 1 flower, I do the bulk and last cutting. Hundreds of my girls have prefered this to me cutting something off every few days. Many methods will work because: It's a weed and will grow like one. My Wk1 Flower final trim only removes lower, insignificant branches, not a ton of leafs. When I say a, "grocery bag" of trimmings, I should have mentioned I have almost 50 big girls in Wk1.

My mothers closet doesn't normally flower, but the girls had survived so much cloning and abuse I couldn't ditch them. I reaped many more branches off these because they were always pruned to attain huge numbers of clones. I got almost 150 viable clones off each of these girls while they vegged. As you can see above, they have been butchered in early life as evident by the non-existence of lower branches. Only my mothers look this way from a lifetime of losing lower growth and retaining only the strongest tops to form the canopy. DO NOT HACK your plants to look like my mothers (Unless they are mothers too).

On every other plant that is not a other: I top in veg (Around Wk4 or just below a foot), then a final trim wk1 of flower (Reap many possible clones with a few hairs already on). An additional leaf every week or so does no more harm in my opinion. If you find something scientific to the contrary, please share. I, and we, can all benefit. I did all my research years ago and lived off experience since. Maybe I missed something. Leafs are vital and should be spared at all costs. But in the rare occurrence when it can not be moved, will losing one leaf make the girl cry? I ask myself, "Is the light getting to that top more important than the nutrients stored in this leaf."

Good luck and godspeed,
-Dude'r

This is the indica strain this is legal and i am a cardholeder its for personal consumption only

too bushy of a plant (especially in scrog) can lead to mold problems. it's ok to remove a few fanleaves to improve air circulation, as long as the leaves you remove were just blocking light from leaves underneath. In general, however, it's best to keep as many leaves on the ;lant as possible...more leaves=more photosynthesis=faster growth=higher yield

ddimebag said:

too bushy of a plant (especially in scrog) can lead to mold problems. it's ok to remove a few fanleaves to improve air circulation, as long as the leaves you remove were just blocking light from leaves underneath. In general, however, it's best to keep as many leaves on the ;lant as possible...more leaves=more photosynthesis=faster growth=higher yield

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I grow in a small cab and removing lower leaves is crucial to the air circulation around my grow bags and around the plants in general. FWIW, just my two cents and what works for me.

the bottoms are all cleaned up already and its just a bushy bitch there arent really any leaves blocking the buds i think in week 5 i will do a little more thinning

Wk5 flower I wouldn't cut a thing you didn't have to. Are you in flower?

TheDuder said:

Wk5 flower I wouldn't cut a thing you didn't have to. Are you in flower?

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I would totally agree on this. I would do as much trimming as possible as the girls stretch, first few weeks of 12/12. I trimmed out of necessity between week 5-6 and consider myself lucky I had no hemi action that I could see, next run trimming much earlier to be safe. Those girls are looking GOOD!! Congrats!

Yeah i think that i am going to leave them be week three i cleaned up all the bottom and popped off all the branches that are ever going to amount to anything. And week 2 i thinned a couple of them out and cut some of the fans and i got to say that the ones i didn't look way better. i have been doing this a long long time i just wanted to see hat you guys all thought about the thinning cause i hear a lot of different stuff all the time, and subcool told me that some of his strains need to be trimmed down but i have always heard never to take leaves off here is a sativa strain

I hate posting pics is it safe its for medical purposes only

Don't put identifying things in your grow room. I heard the RLU server is out of the states and not under any laws that would require RLU to relinquish their members list. Even then, our memberships have no personal info on them. I have done it for years, and there is many on here who have and I've never heard of a problem yet. Anyone else care to give an opinion?