Defoliating In flower??

Kingrow1

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
One thing thats obvious is its more the newer growers thinking defoliating is gona give you more yeild or quality.

Its the same with them wanting to ph soil and stick wet bud in jars. Like how did we ever manage pre - market legal hype times...!

:-)
 
Renfro

Renfro

Well-Known Member
I would ONLY defoliate leaves that are dead or severely damaged. I believe that these fan leaves act as a reservoir for mobile nutrients during later flowering.
 
doublejj

doublejj

Well-Known Member
Kingrow1 said:
Can i book into your resort because ive never seen a destination cater this much for stoners.

Im looking for a week say end of your Summer and if i could have an orchard facing room with smoking terrace, thank you very much :-)
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It's a working Bed & Breakfast Farm.....you can reserve a 40'ft suite with view, running well water, and picnic table. You get a t-shirt and are expected to participate in work on the farm....:wink:
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Hope to see u soon...:cool:
 
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Flowki

Flowki

Well-Known Member
Just a balancing reminder for newbs, if you set up plant spacing properly and have the correct amount of airflow/humidity control you do not NEED to defoliate to increase yield, ever. If you CHOOSE to fuck around with it, so be it, but that's a big difference. None of the pics here posted in support of defoliation are of healthy plants, as in, I would not even consider climbing over mine to get to there's. Might sound harsh but follow the advice of those people and you won't like where you end up. Take care of your spacing, safe ppm amount/ratio and environment, you won't regret that because it will increase yield guaranteed. This whole defoliation shit is highly advertised mostly by people who have not yet learned basic plant care, even if they've grown for years.

Selective upper leaf removal is the version for those with defoliation OCD. If you get your canopy correct you won't have run away rogue leaves blocking light to multiple top bud clusters. Defoliating in that way is trying to fix mistakes made in veg. Mistakes can happen, but the use of defoliation in that way should be specified. It isn't ''increasing yield''.. it is ''recovering from an earlier growing error that was going to reduce yield''. Very definitive difference that should be acknowledged as it gives a complete false positive for defoliation being ''good''.

OP, if you feel the amount of water in on your canopy is that bad, learn why and get it fixed next time. Stripping leaves isn't a fix.. although it may serve as a budget band aid this time round, some yield is better than losing it to rot if you think it's that bad. Or feel free to ignore environment advice and have to consider defoliation to avoid rot every grow to hit a home run.
 
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JSheeze

JSheeze

Well-Known Member
Flowki said:
Just a balancing reminder for newbs, if you set up plant spacing properly and have the correct amount of airflow/humidity control you do not NEED to defoliate to increase yield, ever. If you CHOOSE to fuck around with it, so be it, but that's a big difference. None of the pics here posted in support of defoliation are of healthy plants, as in, I would not even consider climbing over mine to get to there's. Might sound harsh but follow the advice of those people and you won't like where you end up. Take care of your spacing, safe ppm amount/ratio and environment, you won't regret that because it will increase yield guaranteed. This whole defoliation shit is highly advertised mostly by people who have not yet learned basic plant care, even if they've grown for years.

Selective upper leaf removal is the version for those with defoliation OCD. If you get your canopy correct you won't have run away rogue leaves blocking light to multiple top bud clusters. Defoliating in that way is trying to fix mistakes made in veg. Mistakes can happen, but the use of defoliation in that way should be specified. It isn't ''increasing yield''.. it is ''recovering from an earlier growing error that was going to reduce yield''. Very definitive difference that should be acknowledged as it gives a complete false positive for defoliation being ''good''.

OP, if you feel the amount of water in on your canopy is that bad, learn why and get it fixed next time. Stripping leaves isn't a fix.. although it may serve as a budget band aid this time round, some yield is better than losing it to rot if you think it's that bad. Or feel free to ignore environment advice and have to consider defoliation to avoid rot every grow to hit a home run.
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Provide some data? Some try to maximize their grow area. By trimming excess leaves you make room for buds to grow up in their place. You reduce the footprint of a bud so that your essentially growing buds where some of your big fan leaves would be. Its just preference and I do agree with you about having defoliation OCD lol but there's a positive trade-off in defoliation (imo) that you are not respecting. If you have limited space and light angles and light density, cropping your plant to maximize the environment its growing in is definitely plausible and worth trying.

Here's a study they did defoliating tomato plants, results found that some defoliation actually produced bigger and more total fruit (they ran it 4 times)...
https://scialert.net/fulltext/?doi=ja.2016.68.75
 
ANC

ANC

Well-Known Member
I think if there is anything if there is anything we can learn from how strictly the two sides stick to their guns, is that weed will mostly pretty much grow satisfactorily regardless of what you do.

I also learned today there is something called a skinny pig when I went to the pet shop.
 
Flowki

Flowki

Well-Known Member
JSheeze said:
Provide some data? Some try to maximize their grow area. By trimming excess leaves you make room for buds to grow up in their place. You reduce the footprint of a bud so that your essentially growing buds where some of your big fan leaves would be. Its just preference and I do agree with you about having defoliation OCD lol but there's a positive trade-off in defoliation (imo) that you are not respecting. If you have limited space and light angles and light density, cropping your plant to maximize the environment its growing in is definitely plausible and worth trying.

Here's a study they did defoliating tomato plants, results found that some defoliation actually produced bigger and more total fruit (they ran it 4 times)...
https://scialert.net/fulltext/?doi=ja.2016.68.75
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That research is pretty much the jist of all the objective scientific research I've ever read on the matter. From that page alone you can draw all the favourite statements defoliation mj growers use such as ''increases yield'' ''don't defoliate too much'' ''don't defoliate after stretch'' etc etc.

But look at it from another angle if you will. As far as I can tell such experiments are on none modified plants (as in not trained in any way). That's already a key difference to remember. From that, defoliation of those plants (to a point) increased leaf mass and that leads to increased yield, I have no question of that being true, it is. Defoliating too much, even stated in your study, had a negative effect. They also mention that in those unmodified tomato plants, increase branching occurs and thus increased bud sites, along with elongation of the main stem. That is the speculated result of the plant quickly making way for new leaves (it has an established root system to react in that way). New leaves come in smaller, possibly being an added reason for increased leaf surface area or ''optimisation'' (subjectively).

In one way or another, what people have took crudely from studies like this is ''defoliation in flower increases bud density''. You can see why they believe that from poor interpretation of such things above.

Think about all those up sides I've mentioned for those tomato plants, more yet smaller leaves, more branching, more bud sites. Guess what else does all that, even better and in a much safer way?. Topping. You might think I am being a smart ass but think about it.

Now look at the downsides of defoliation in your study alone. Elongated main stem (we typically don't want that indoor). If defoliated too much you lose yield, added risk of hermy and potentially longer flower times or shorter>less mature. You can probably see where this is going.. guess what reduces plant height and is difficult to do too much of while avoiding any stress related issues in flower, topping ;p.

Defoliators, particularly new growers should spend more time mastering environment, topping amount, spacing and plant count. Not wasting time with defoliation band aid's that also run other risks other than reduced yield, such as hermy or later finishes. They will increase yield objectively for certain by forgetting defoliation and concentrating on those other aspects.. while the beter they get at them, clearly they will see no or very little need to defoliate.

As I said earlier sometimes a rogue leaf gets away and blocks shit, but the distinction should always be made that even having to remove one single upper fan leaf is a micro failure on the growers part, who messed up somewhere in the earlier stages (it happens). Or they just can't help themselves and have to cut perfectly healthy leaves off, those people exist too.

Not to rattle on but hopefully an example to help newer growers understand.

Imagine you topped your plants once and then had 4 main colas per plant in flower, say 8 plants total. If one of those main tops stretched above the rest and got closer to the light, it, and it's associated leaves would indeed block a lot of light getting across the canopy to the other plants. Defoliating that entire cola may increase over all yield as it then lets some light get past to the rest of the canopy. But that isn't really increasing yield, you are still losing yield.. just not as much since defoliating has made the best of a bad set-up.

If you topped the plants 3 times instead of 1 (example), and aimed to keep the canopy level during stretch (perhaps a scrog net used also) then none of the tops will get into a position to block light from the others, with correct lighting. All bud sites and associated leaves will be in light, no defoliation will be required and the over all yield will blow the first example out of the water. And that isn't opinion, at it's core pure physics backs it.

I used those examples because I strongly feel this is where a lot of the defoliators are getting the idea it ''increases yield'' from.
 
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jondamon

jondamon

Well-Known Member
This is as much defoliation that I do.

This is 8 days into 12/12 where I have super cropped a little to control height and lightly lollypopped before switching to 12/12.

I have done this for a better canopy and so that I don’t have shifty little fluff at the bottom of the plant which is going to be outside the useable penetration of my 400w light.
 

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ChiefRunningPhist

ChiefRunningPhist

Well-Known Member
Flowki said:
but the distinction should always be made that even having to remove one single upper fan leaf is a micro failure on the growers part, who messed up somewhere in the earlier stages (it happens). Or they just can't help themselves and have to cut perfectly healthy leaves off, those people exist too.
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Flowki said:
That research is pretty much the jist of all the objective scientific research I've ever read on the matter. From that page alone you can draw all the favourite statements defoliation mj growers use such as ''increases yield'' ''don't defoliate too much'' ''don't defoliate after stretch'' etc etc.

But look at it from another angle if you will. As far as I can tell such experiments are on none modified plants (as in not trained in any way). That's already a key difference to remember. From that, defoliation of those plants (to a point) increased leaf mass and that leads to increased yield, I have no question of that being true, it is. Defoliating too much, even stated in your study, had a negative effect. They also mention that in those unmodified tomato plants, increase branching occurs and thus increased bud sites, along with elongation of the main stem. That is the speculated result of the plant quickly making way for new leaves (it has an established root system to react in that way). New leaves come in smaller, possibly being an added reason for increased leaf surface area or ''optimisation'' (subjectively).

In one way or another, what people have took crudely from studies like this is ''defoliation in flower increases bud density''. You can see why they believe that from poor interpretation of such things above.

Think about all those up sides I've mentioned for those tomato plants, more yet smaller leaves, more branching, more bud sites. Guess what else does all that, even better and in a much safer way?. Topping. You might think I am being a smart ass but think about it.

Now look at the downsides of defoliation in your study alone. Elongated main stem (we typically don't want that indoor). If defoliated too much you lose yield, added risk of hermy and potentially longer flower times or shorter>less mature. You can probably see where this is going.. guess what reduces plant height and is difficult to do too much of while avoiding any stress related issues in flower, topping ;p.

Defoliators, particularly new growers should spend more time mastering environment, topping amount, spacing and plant count. Not wasting time with defoliation band aid's that also run other risks other than reduced yield, such as hermy or later finishes. They will increase yield objectively for certain by forgetting defoliation and concentrating on those other aspects.. while the beter they get at them, clearly they will see no or very little need to defoliate.

As I said earlier sometimes a rogue leaf gets away and blocks shit, but the distinction should always be made that even having to remove one single upper fan leaf is a micro failure on the growers part, who messed up somewhere in the earlier stages (it happens). Or they just can't help themselves and have to cut perfectly healthy leaves off, those people exist too.

Not to rattle on but hopefully an example to help newer growers understand.

Imagine you topped plants once and then had 4 main colas in flower, say 8 plants. If one of those main tops stretched above the rest and got closer to the light, it, and it's associated leaves would indeed block a lot of light getting across the canopy to the other plants. Defoliating that entire cola may increase over all yield as it then lets some light get past to the rest of the canopy. But that isn't really increasing yield, you are still losing yield.. just not as much since defoliating has made the best of a bad set-up.

If you topped the plants 3 times instead of 1, and aimed to keep the canopy level during stretch (perhaps a scrog net used also) then none of the tops will get into a position to block light from the others, with correct lighting. All bud sites and associated leaves will be in light, no defoliation will be required and the over all yield will blow the first example out of the water.
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Sounds reasonable but the data, at least with tomatoes, is that defoliating 3/16 lower leaves actually increases yield. @JSheeze might have gone too far (according to the data) but in terms of documented data, some defoliation is better than none. If you can provide some data, your argument would hold a lot more weight, with me at least.

You mentioned defoliating as a precursor to hermie, but the argument that not defoliating leads to PM could also be made. It seems to me that it's situational to the strain and your environment. Some grows are harder than others to control for RH and light height, so there are definitely people that benefit from such environmentally adaptive cropping. It is a tool to be used when needed as necessary and the data points to increased yield with some defoliation.

I'm not sticking my head in the sand. Provide me some data to help me see what so far the one research paper contradicts.
 
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Kingrow1

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
ChiefRunningPhist said:
Sounds reasonable but the data, at least with tomatoes, is that defoliating 3/16 lower leaves actually increases yield. @JSheeze might have gone too far (according to the data) but in terms of documented data, some defoliation is better than none. If you can provide some data,your argument would hold a lot more weight, with me at least.

You mentioned defoliating as a precursor to hermie, but the argument that not defoliating leads to PM could also be made. It seems to me that it's situational to the strain and your environment. Some grows are harder than others to control for RH and light height, so there are definitely people that benefit from such environmentally adaptive cropping. It is a tool to be used when needed as necessary and the data points to increased yield with some defoliation.

I'm not sticking my head in the sand. Provide me some data to help me see what so far the one research paper contradicts.
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Yer i was thinking of anything that needs defoliating to increase yeilds and vine tomatos do your right :-)
 
JSheeze

JSheeze

Well-Known Member
Flowki said:
In one way or another, what people have took crudely from studies like this is ''defoliation in flower increases bud density''. You can see why they believe that from poor interpretation of such things above.
Click to expand...
The only thing that I interpret is that there is a yield benefit to some defoliating in tomatoes. Seems plausible to translate that to cannabis but I wouldn't say that it's proof. So far it's the only thing that has been documented (although I didn't look hard).

@ChiefRunningPhist ya lol I picked a few too many but she'll pull through :bigjoint:
 
Kingrow1

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
JSheeze said:
The only thing that I interpret is that there is a yield benefit to some defoliating in tomatoes. Seems plausible to translate that to cannabis but I wouldn't say that it's proof. So far it's the only thing that has been documented (although I didn't look hard).

@ChiefRunningPhist ya lol I picked a few too many but she'll pull through :bigjoint:
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Tomatos do not increase yeilds defoliating bushes only vines, this is merely a training practice that works but yes im sure there will be others :-)
 
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