Cutting Fan Leaves? A Mythbuster style experiment...

[Pullin' weeds]

im not bashing or wasnt trying to i am subed and watching but i just dont see it. Will keep negitivity to a min. Good luck

Thanks.
I don't really buy the idea that one side of the plant has anything to do with the other, so wanted to test that as well. If doing something to one side affects the other, a plant would grow symetrically.
So if one side of my plant does much better than the other cause it's getting better light penetration - kinda puts that whole idea in doubt...
Likewise, I've cut branches, or even chopped half the plant - No stress, the other side keeps right on truckin...

Again - it's an experiment. One that will hopefully generate some real data. I hope we can learn something. Maybe it confirms our view, maybe it changes it. Thats what it's all about.

 

[Pullin' weeds]

Yeah in Japan. Wow you lived in a nice place. This past spring we went to Kyoto and just walked the city with brownies totally tripping. Just told the navi where we wanted to go and did what it said.

Loved walking old Kyoto at night. I lived in an old castle town - tons of history. I miss it.

 

[choempi]

I likes outside box

 

[aknight3]

this looks interesting im sorry if i didnt catch it but its the same clone right? if not this experiment is kind of pointless, anyway scribed if so good luck friend

 

[Pullin' weeds]

Thanks for stopping!

 

[wannaquickee]

have we all decided if we can cut our leaves off yet

 

[IXOYE]

Cool! I'm subscribing to yet another interesting "pullin weeds" thread here. How long are you planning on conducting this experiement for?

 

[findme]

subbed!!!

lalalalaalalalal

 

[BOMBADILLO]

Heya.....I thought I would jump in here because I have me a 3 month old, 5ft high plant that i've just started trimming & this is mighty interesting.

Grown a few plants before, in pots & only little guys. This dude, I only chucked a seed in the corner of the vege garden as an afterthought. The fucker really took off! Up until last week, I had left it alone to do its own thing, I was letting nature sort it out BUT i've seen ZERO action as far as buds are concerned. So, i've started trimming all the fan leaves to see if it'll get things going. Its in a good spot, gets a lot of sun & plenty of watering & i've fertilised it with chicken shit & a bit of carp, so i'm hoping this is a good plan. I'll try & get some pics up.

Looking forward to the results of this little experiment....yours & mine but any advice would be sweet. Cheers!

 

[bluunttoface]

Finallyyyy

Thank you!!!

 

[bluunttoface]

this looks interesting im sorry if i didnt catch it but its the same clone right? if not this experiment is kind of pointless, anyway scribed if so good luck friend

The Experiment:
One plant will be trained (LST) to produce 2 approx equal sides in terms of number and size of potential colas. Using 1 plant eliminates the variables of veg time, genetics, plant vigor, watering and feeding, etc... A white divider will be installed between the sides, shielding light/shade from each other. The lower portion of the shield will be open to allow for air and water circulation. This plant will cycle through my grow space, fed as usual and rotated 90 deg each day for even light distribution. Once placed into flower, neither side will recieve any additional branch training. Determined by coin toss, One side of the plant will be trimmed progressively throughout flower of about 50% of the fan leaves, the other side will be allowed to grow "naturally". (or as natural as it can under artificial HPS and CFL lighting, artificial wind, etc...)

Although im sure 2 exact clones under the same condition would also yield VERY similar results.

 

[Pullin' weeds]

Thanks for stopping all!
Nothing to really report, but I wouldn't expect to see any difference at this point. Just starting to stretch...

I did just pull 43g from 2 - 23w cfls in my "annex" cab though! Woot!! I posted on the indoor forum. Check it out...

 

[Lindseyb]

Well could we all get a summary up to this point? I have a humongo 8in mutant fan leaf and some published book said prune fan leafs bigger than 4-5 in. IDK what to do.

 

[Pullin' weeds]

Well could we all get a summary up to this point? I have a humongo 8in mutant fan leaf and some published book said prune fan leafs bigger than 4-5 in. IDK what to do.

If it's blocking out other bud sites, I'd try to tuck it out of the way, if that doesn't help - trim it out.
Summary: about 15 days into flower - a few leaves have been trimmed on the trim side to prevent light blockage on a couple sites, but no visible difference...

 

[guy incognito]

This is a mythbuster style experiment. Meaning it's uncontrolled and unreliable and not real science.

I agree with a lot of people here. I just don't understand how this can be accomplished with a single plant. One of the basic legs of the theory you are testing is that "Trimming leaves stresses the plant and weakens it, decreasing the yield."

 

[Pullin' weeds]

This is a mythbuster style experiment. Meaning it's uncontrolled and unreliable and not real science.

I agree with a lot of people here. I just don't understand how this can be accomplished with a single plant. One of the basic legs of the theory you are testing is that "Trimming leaves stresses the plant and weakens it, decreasing the yield."

I agree - it's not "real science". I don't have a controlled lab, I'm not recording anything - I never claimed it to be real science. First sentance of this thread - "I'm doing this for my own interest". If you don't like it - run your own experiment. I'll be happy to read your results.

I'm not testing "trimming stresses the plant, decreases yield" - I'm really first testing the more basic idea "does one side affect the other". Most people say it does - I'm not convinced. Water and nutes affect the whole plant, but those are different plant system than photosynthisis - which is more localized. The flow of water and nutes travels in one direction - from roots through the stems and out the leaves - this leaves little room for any lateral transfer of energy. One side shouldn't give a damn what the other side gets

 

[nothingtodeclare]

as others have said i really think you need two clones from same plant take 2 seeds out of a packet plant them both they are both given same medium same ph'd water same nutes both under equally the same light now 1 plant produced you say 75 gram yield and the other produced you 50 gram yield the one plant you have could take all the stress in the world and still produce you great yield with you stripping fan leaves an when you produced your great yields you will be sayin how stripping the leaves produced excellent results when it could be just a great pheno so with out a control plant there is nothing to compare ie you need to clones from same plant or am i wrong but i still will follow to see what happens good luck as said it is your experiment but as others have said you will not know really if it worked other than it survived the pruining and produce x amount of yield peace

 

[guy incognito]

I agree - it's not "real science". I don't have a controlled lab, I'm not recording anything - I never claimed it to be real science. First sentance of this thread - "I'm doing this for my own interest". If you don't like it - run your own experiment. I'll be happy to read your results.

I'm not testing "trimming stresses the plant, decreases yield" - I'm really first testing the more basic idea "does one side affect the other". Most people say it does - I'm not convinced. Water and nutes affect the whole plant, but those are different plant system than photosynthisis - which is more localized. The flow of water and nutes travels in one direction - from roots through the stems and out the leaves - this leaves little room for any lateral transfer of energy. One side shouldn't give a damn what the other side gets

If you take a plant and destroy one side though it will certainly affect the health of the other side. The entire plant is a cohesive organism.

 

[Pullin' weeds]

I disagree - tress, shrubs, plants of many types get trimmed and pruned to the extreme all the time without negatively impacting their health. Why not cannabis? Organisms don't always grow symetrically.
And thus we have an experiment!

 

[Harrekin]

No offense but I dont think this experiment will give you the results your looking for...for ANY experiment you need a control, you cant compare results to themselves.

Quoted from Wiki cos too lazy to type in own words:
"A controlled experiment generally compares the results obtained from an experimental sample against a control sample, which is practically identical to the experimental sample except for the one aspect whose effect is being tested (the independent variable)".