Trimming bushy fan leaves (Vegetative stage)

Hello I have a few questions reguarding my first grow here. I have a tent setup with a 20k lumen fluorescent over a 2x2 ebb and flow system. I have 4 plants all about 3 weeks into veg and they are kinda short and really bushy. Id say they are around half a foot tall from the hydroton covering the rockwool.

They seem to be getting really bushy and all the pictures I c online of plants of similar size seem to be alot less bushy. Should I trim the small fan leaves that are under the big fan leaves? These small fan leaves are bent every which way and are one huge cluster fuck near the stock of the plant (or stem) and I dont know if I should leave them until the plants gets bigger or what but no light hits these leaves and they arent growing straight because they have nowhere to grow.

Also have another small problem with my light. I try to keep it as close to the plants as I can but sense they are a little spread apart for space purposes they are still under the light but they are starting to branch out from under the light and the only way to get the light distributed to each plant is to raise the light a little bit. Id say the light is about a foot away from the plants tops. Is this a problem? I dont have the cash to buy another 150$ sun blaze light but I can see that would be the ultimate solution.

just changed my avatar to the most recent picture that I just took. This way who ever wants to help me with my questions can see how far the light is and I know you cant see how the little fan leaves are all bunched up but anybody who has grown hydroponically should know what im talking about.

Bushy plants are no problem bud! I'd let it be and keep doing what you are doing. The leaves provide the plant energy. No need to take that away from them while in veg. Yes, more light would be ideal. My guess is you just have a heavily Indica dominant strain and it probably just grows bushy regardless! Good luck and hope this helps!

i wouldn't touch it there will be limbs every play the leaves come out, your plants look great

Damn! newbie central seems is the place to be lol.. 2 min after my thread post and all these replies makes me feel warm inside! lol thnx for the feedback and yes it helped to know my shit looks legit ^_^

Seriously bushy is good. here is a pic of mine to show yah how bushy indica strains can be. Just think, more leafs more energy. Now if a leaf is like 75% gone or yellow or what ever thats a diff story.
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Qwick2blaze1 said:

Seriously bushy is good. here is a pic of mine to show yah how bushy indica strains can be. Just think, more leafs more energy. Now if a leaf is like 75% gone or yellow or what ever thats a diff story.
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well thats just about as bushy as it gets !!! lol nice plants. With with plants that bushy whats the best way to bud them because really I cant see how light gets down to deeper nodes >.<

don't touch those fan leaves, I don't know what a Sun Blaze light is, T5 tubes ?

Honestly I cover every inch I can with reflection material , even the door, it has been very rewarding as far as helping push light to the lower leaves. So it was not as big of a problem for me even with just two bulbs to reach thoes lower leafs , but I know even better results would come from two more of the Stealth hydro dual spectrum II bulbs to penetrate to the lower leaves once it gets this bushy.
I have in fact now gotten 4 of the flowering bulbs from them same style as the 2 veg lights I used and I will start using thoes tomorrow!

Nice plants man i would trim some of the fans on a couple of your plants and compair them i have done it since about day 15 in my grow and i have found that it promotes growth in the nodes around the trimmed fan leaves and they just get bigger pic 1 is my plant after i trimmed the big fans off and pic 2 is 3 days later and so many of the bud sites are coming to the top of the plant which later on in flower is where you want them plus it gets them used to any trimming you may do later on.But every body does it there own way its you will fine yours.
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frmrboi said:

don't touch those fan leaves, I don't know what a Sun Blaze light is, T5 tubes ?

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Yes its just a 4ft 4 tube t5 6500k blue spec 20k lumen fluorescent light

smokefish106 said:

Nice plants man i would trim some of the fans on a couple of your plants and compair them i have done it since about day 15 in my grow and i have found that it promotes growth in the nodes around the trimmed fan leaves and they just get bigger pic 1 is my plant after i trimmed the big fans off and pic 2 is 3 days later and so many of the bud sites are coming to the top of the plant which later on in flower is where you want them plus it gets them used to any trimming you may do later on.But every body does it there own way its you will fine yours.
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I think I get what your saying and that sounds like a plausable idea but I dont think they are big enough for trimming the big fans yet being as how they is really only 1 or 2 sets of major fan leaves so far. Ill probably wait a few more weeks.

Hijinxx said:

Yes its just a 4ft 4 tube t5 6500k blue spec 20k lumen fluorescent light

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that's why they're so short & bushy, 6500 K light.
Here's what I'd do, Drop that fixture down at least to 6inches above, put aluminum foil, mylar or whatever over all the hydroton.
Make sidewall reflectors out of foil or mylar so that it drops right into the table so basically all your light is trapped inside that side drop.
If you want them to open up swap out some 6500 K tubes for 3000 K (I believe that's what T5 flowering tubes are)

I love my bushes! My T5 has all 6500k, hanging 9"-14" above the plants.
I'll flower under a HPS

frmrboi said:

that's why they're so short & bushy, 6500 K light.
Here's what I'd do, Drop that fixture down at least to 6inches above, put aluminum foil, mylar or whatever over all the hydroton.
Make sidewall reflectors out of foil or mylar so that it drops right into the table so basically all your light is trapped inside that side drop.
If you want them to open up swap out some 6500 K tubes for 3000 K (I believe that's what T5 flowering tubes are)

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Think I should just put them under my 600w HPS light? its a monster lol

So a few people have said that cutting the bigger fan leaves can be a good idea to promote growth to lower nodes.. Should I just cut the 2 biggest fan leafs on each plant? and by cutting these leaves should I cut them all the way off or just cut the tips of each leaf on the fan, this is my first grow so I am unexperienced in this area, this is something thats hard to research and seems you have to figure it out for yourself but I hate failure so I wanna make sure its the right move before cutting these big ass leafs off my plants

i trimmed 14 fan leaves from each of my 4 jock horrors, some were bigger than my hand but i had to do it due to space issues, ive seen no reduction in growth and it the light is hitting the branches the would have been shaded by all those leaves, try it with one of your plants only and watch the results,

solvalou said:

i trimmed 14 fan leaves from each of my 4 jock horrors, some were bigger than my hand but i had to do it due to space issues, ive seen no reduction in growth and it the light is hitting the branches the would have been shaded by all those leaves, try it with one of your plants only and watch the results,

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Good Idea, I just cut 4 of the biggest leafs off my AK 48 ... should watch and see what happend ^^

When you're about to flower cut some off not the whole leaf, just parts of it that's blocking budsites. There's a reason why the tops are the biggest and fullest. Also a reason why lower nugs are smaller.

benny blanco said:

When you're about to flower cut some off not the whole leaf, just parts of it that's blocking budsites. There's a reason why the tops are the biggest and fullest. Also a reason why lower nugs are smaller.

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I just cut off 4 of the big big fan leaves on the back left plant seen in my avatar.. it definitely looks pruned but the lower nodes are recieving light now. This is my AK-48 strain and its a really strong strain so hopefully I see huge growth in the small leaves under those big fan leaves.