There are some key debates that i often see in a majority of cannabis boards. Most of them deal with light, soils, ferts, and the most famous "is it ready?" There is one however, that i see asked quite a bit but never really see any answer to other than general ideas. So I thought i would share my thoughts on this.
Should I trim my plants? Depends or does it? I see this pop up from time to time and the answers are usually vague. I my self have been guilty of posting short one line answers for this, but in detail its all most too much for someones thread. One of the key points to the life of a plant is the ability for it to store food and then metabolize it and turn in into energy to grow. In its vegetative state the plant begins to warehouse this energy into its larger fan leaves for later usage. As it grows it develops several of these warehouses until it reaches maturity, either by nature or control, and then moves its energy to producing flowers.
As we feed these plants ferts over there life span, we give the plant something to boost the level of energy that it stores. So with that in mind think about this. Over the course of its life we monitor the levels of nutrients we apply in order to find the max we can feed them with out burning them, that way in the end we can benefit from the results of or hard work. But if we strip this away what have we worked for?
In the past i have done my fair share of clipping and manicuring, i have also learned many things from it. Hense my motto "the less you mess with them, the less you stress them." I don't know what it is about cannabis cultivators having the itch to snip and clip. For some reason there is some little monster in all of us that likes to use scissors on plants....
With that being said I will go over the times i have found useful as well as a mistake. My first grow was in a DWC set up that i made from scratch. First off this was a challenge for me as it not only was my first DWC, it was my first grow ever. There was TONS of learning involved. At about 5 inches i decided to top. End result was a bush as intended but with the beginning of 4 new branches. As she grew she bushed over the edges of the bucket she was in. As she grew the bottom leaves were showing evident signs that they were not getting enough light. There were new side branching sites that were three nodes high but all had a three leave pattern. This showed that that the bottom was not getting enough light to mature properly. As the nodes grow the leaves should two. 1, 3, 5 and so on and so forth. As long as there is proper light and nitrogen in the veg state they should progress in this manner. I have had all the way up to 11.
So i clipped them. I clipped the bottom eighth of the plant. Removing anything that did not show progressive growth. The result of this was more than i can handle. I removed a section of the plant that was doing nothing but being dormant. I saw the plant as wasting energy on keeping something undeveloped alive. The tops of the plant exploded. I think from two things, the massive amounts of O2 the roots were receiving, allowing production of new growth, and the fact that the plant could focus its energy upward now. Long story short i had to super crop the top into flower resulting in out growth of the box and small tops .... Like i said learned a thing or two.
There are adverse effects on plants when too much trimming is done. It doesn't harm the plant it just tends to slow the plant down. In the world of the auto slowing a plant down has bad effects. Autos have no real recover time and need to be messed with as little as possible for them to reach their full potential.
I see some hydro and soil growers a like take 1/3 or more of the bottom of the plant. If this is taken late into veg this WILL impact the results of your buds. If you removed the ware house there is no food stock. the sugar leaves that are laced in between the buds are not enough to feed her. You'll notice yourself feeding her higher levels of ferts in the end as she finishes, due to the fact she has no natural food to pull from. This often makes for a harsh smoke as the levels of ferts in the medium is high and requires a heavy flush.
If you allow the plant to naturally use the food stored in its fan leaves its giving the plant exactly what it needs, when it needs it. By removing the nutrients out of the soil you force the plant to eat its self and during the end of flower this, i think, is key. If you remove the warehouses the plant has noting to rely on other than what you were feeding it. So you have done two things, removed its food stock and flushed out all the food you were putting in the soil. Giving the buds nothing to swell with. During the last weeks of her life she is going to work the hardest and i think for her to be efficient she needs that natural source of food.
I can tell you this. During my past grows i didnt remove one leaf in order to test the natural ability of this plant. I wanted to see her in her full potential under the best conditions i could provide, and she thanked me. I now remove a few fans that have faded out fully to yellow as they are technically dead. The result of this was good as this allowed some more air into the thick head bud and the one bud below has swollen almost double in the last day due to new light. As she yellows more and more each day the buds get fatter and fatter, and i see fields of resin getting milkier and milkier. This alone makes a believer out of me.
