How should I train my outdoor plants this summer?

[GlassJoe]

Howdy rollers, I'm looking to manage the size and yield of my outdoor plants. They're all in the range of 4 to 5ish nodes and counting, and my current plan is to try and make a manifold.

Is making a manifold a waste of time outdoors? Should I just top, or LST instead? I have two 5x5 mesh screens on stakes for SCROG, plus another I plan to use for vertical trellising against a wall.

Here are some of the plants:

 

[smokinrav]

The sun has few limits regarding light penetration. I would LST and let it grow, forget the screens. This from someone who has grown for decades, but never outdoors.
My bucket list includes LST an outdoor plant. Hope you do well!

 

[hotrodharley]

I top 3 times in a row starting low and early. I start snapping the branches just as early. I can keep most strains belly high and fairly level. The taller strains you just snap the branches more. The healing slows vertical growth. On purpose in this case.

 

[GlassJoe]

I top 3 times in a row starting low and early. I start snapping the branches just as early. I can keep most strains belly high and fairly level. The taller strains you just snap the branches more. The healing slows vertical growth. On purpose in this case.

When you say snap, you're talking about high-stress training, supercropping, whatever you want to call bending it downwards? Also how low would you top? Would you top the plants shown in the pictures?

 

[hotrodharley]

When you say snap, you're talking about high-stress training, supercropping, whatever you want to call bending it downwards? Also how low would you top? Would you top the plants shown in the pictures?

Supercrop. Exactly. My connection is too slow to open pictures. But I top at the 4th node. Sometimes the third of the fan leaves are already 5. I then top the resulting new shoots as soon as possible and then I do it again. That leaves 8 main branches. By starting your shaping early its easy to form a circle with the canopy. I continue to supercrop into flower. Until about 2 weeks in when the stems ain’t taking that no more.

 

[GlassJoe]

Supercrop. Exactly. My connection is too slow to open pictures. But I top at the 4th node. Sometimes the third of the fan leaves are already 5. I then top the resulting new shoots as soon as possible and then I do it again. That leaves 8 main branches. By starting your shaping early its easy to form a circle with the canopy. I continue to supercrop into flower. Until about 2 weeks in when the stems ain’t taking that no more.

That sounds like what I'll probably do; do you clear absolutely everything out below the topped node? In the case of topping at #4, the shoots at #1-3 get cut, plus all the fan leaves, leaving only the two fans and two shoots at #4.

 

[hotrodharley]

That sounds like what I'll probably do; do you clear absolutely everything out below the topped node? In the case of topping at #4, the shoots at #1-3 get cut, plus all the fan leaves, leaving only the two fans and two shoots at #4.

I veg outdoors here in summer. The Land of the Midnight Sun. So I leave everything until I bring them in to flower. By then lower branches root easily and produce big plants. Outdoors just leave everything. The lower especially so ground crawlers eat that hopefully. Sprinkle diatomaceous earth liberally around the bases.

 

[cherrybobeddie]

I would like to try a y trellis. Put two or three wires from one y post to the next. Then just keep tucking shoots under the wires. Keep the center open.