It absolutely gains yield when you pluck leaves from BUSHES. The people who oppose plucking leaves are most likely growing little guys where it's just not necessary to do it. If you grow big monsters you would know that you absolutely must trim the fan leaves away half way through flower to avoid larfy buds and oddly, when you pluck the leaves you don't only see the shaded buds plump up but you also see the colas grow bigger. I cannot tell you the science behind it, I just think of it as transfer of energy. But it's real though, I just did a side by side where at day 30 I removed all the leaves from one tree and left alone the other two. By day 50, I was so pissed that I didn't do all the plants that I spent 2 hours removing leaves from the other two and abandoned the side by side experiment. I can look and clearly see a huge difference in size, maturity and density of the buds, inside the plant and at the bottom and the colas. The buds that are totally shaded will be far less mature as well as smaller than they could be. Underdeveloped and immature.