simple topping method

[frankcooper]

I've topped my plants before, always been too weary of the consequences. Anyway I'm just wonder what sort of effect placing a cap or small cup over the tip of the plant would have on it? Would this cause the extra colas to grow, and then you could remove the cap to have an additional cola?? Or might it increase side branching?

 

[+ WitchDoctor +]

Hard to say, you'll probably have to try it out for us man. I read a study a few months ago where they used a small transparent piece of green material (like what a light would shine through to turn white light green) to change the spectrum to green and kept it over just one fan leaf for a few days. The green leaf can't absorb the green light, so it turned yellow and started to die.

So I'm not sure about holding a cap over it, but you this would definitely accomplish what you are trying to do. However, when you top, FIM, or pinch the top of a plant, the plant immediately works to heal itself and continue healthy growth. I'm not sure that trying to stunt or slow down the growth from the top bud is the best way for the plant to continue healthy growth, as it seems possible that it could cause extra stress to the whole plant.

But give it a try, let us know.

 

[Nukebisket]

or you can just bend the tip down and the side branches will become main branches and you will still have the original "tip"

 

[frankcooper]

or you can just bend the tip down and the side branches will become main branches and you will still have the original "tip"

what happens to the tip once u tie it down. i assume it tried to grow vertically again.

 

[Saldaw]

i tried it by wrapping the top with a piece of black plastic.. it didnt really do anything except slow the growth. but maybe it wasnt light tight enough?

 

[Nukebisket]

what happens to the tip once u tie it down. i assume it tried to grow vertically again.

yes it will, and you will have a bunch of main branches with it

 

[+ WitchDoctor +]

yes it will, and you will have a bunch of main branches with it

Yea, that's a great way to go about things. Much nicer for the plant.

If you bend the tip to the left and right 90 degrees it will stop it from growing for a short time and slow it down enough for other branches to catch up as well.

 

[frankcooper]

so is it better to bend the tip than to cut off the tip?

 

[+ WitchDoctor +]

so is it better to bend the tip than to cut off the tip?

There's no better, just opinions and style. You have to find out what works for you. Even if your set-up was similar to mine, and your soil was similar to mine, and your nutrients were similar to mine, watering methods, temps, lights, fans, ducting...etc.....your plant would still grow a little differently than any of ours.

Cutting the tip off is a fine way to go. I used to top once, and then top 4 times 2 weeks later, then veg for two weeks and flip and I'd have about 8 colas and some lower branches for hash and tincture. I had good results.

Now I FIM at about 8 inches instead of cutting the whole tip, and then lollipop and either super crop or bend some tips back and forth. There is also another method that is I believe called breaking the "inner hurd" which I don't have any experience with yet.

 

[mccumcumber]

Just super crop if you want to keep everything in tact.
https://www.rollitup.org/general-marijuana-growing/513558-crimping.html#post7156707
^post four I give a tutorial.

 

[dvs1038]

yeah exactly everyone already said it but what u wanna do is supercrop it, that will give u more grow tips.

 

[TheNewGuyy]

can i do this 4th week in flower? i want the tops to stop growing. just bend them to the left or right 90 degrees?

 

[+ WitchDoctor +]

Plants don't do any vegetative growing during flowering. The advice we gave was for vegetative growth, and veg growth during the first 2-3 weeks of 12/12. After that you plants put all of their energy into growing flowers. But during vegetative growth you can bend the tops to the left and right 90 degrees and that should "Stunt" the bud that you bend enough to let the other branches catch up in height a little. Or you can just snip off the top bud.

 

[skunkd0c]

Plants don't do any vegetative growing during flowering. The advice we gave was for vegetative growth, and veg growth during the first 2-3 weeks of 12/12. After that you plants put all of their energy into growing flowers. But during vegetative growth you can bend the tops to the left and right 90 degrees and that should "Stunt" the bud that you bend enough to let the other branches catch up in height a little. Or you can just snip off the top bud.

This really depends on strain and when you put the plants into flower
some plants will grow for many weeks into the 12/12 period before they reach a final size
more noticeable on long flowering sativa and hybrids which can still be growing after week 6 of 12/12

peace

 

[+ WitchDoctor +]

This really depends on strain and when you put the plants into flower
some plants will grow for many weeks into the 12/12 period before they reach a final size
more noticeable on long flowering sativa and hybrids which can still be growing after week 6 of 12/12

peace

I'd like to know which strain is still producing new growth from the top of the plant lol. I mean no offense, I understand that branches are still thickening and the plant may be getting a little taller and have more girth, but topping or bending to top shoot of a plant is a technique that is used to stop that bud in particular from growing taller, not the plant.

So since his question was will bending the top bud 90 degrees both ways stop the top of the plant from growing, the answer is NO in my opinion. It would only cause the flowering plant (even a 14 weeks sativa would be in early flower by week 4) stress and the rest of the plant, including that bud, will continue to grow upwards towards the light. And at best the 14 week sativa would now be a 15 weeks sativa due to stressing the main cola.

@NewGuy, if your colas grow to tall and are too close to the light, you can actually gently bend the whole branches down a little and zip tie or use twine to tie the branch to a stake or something. I have a low basement and before I got better at pruning my sativas would get to tall so I would have to throw in another 4 ft stake towards the outside of the pot and bend the cola down and ziptie it at whatever height it needed to be. Some of my plants looked like they had wreaths around them.

 

[TheNewGuyy]

dang... well i bent a few of my main colas so their kind of broken... lol. I have a trellis up and their resting on that but broken at the same time. will the plant heal it and keep the buds getting fatter? and yeah mine is a bluedream skywalker hybrid and pretty much doubled in height since 12/12 cycle.

 

[+ WitchDoctor +]

Yes that big growth always surprises me, no matter how many times I see it. I flip my plants and they hardly grow for the first week, but then in 3 days BAM they're gigantic. Lol.

I would take a piece of a stake or a popsicle stick or something and gently tie it to the cola where it is bent, like a makeshift splint for a broken finger. If it's bent to the point where the trim leaves start to droop and don't pick back up...cut it off cleanly as close to the next healthy node. It'll affect yield a tiny bit and might take an extra week or so to finish flowering, but you'll be ok. Next time that happens just throw another stake in the pot and gently bend the cola down to it.

With sativas I like to use the 18" tomato cages they sell at home depot..not the big metal ones but the plastic coated green ones. You can top or FIM a sativa at about 6 inches and then a couple weeks later super crop. Then veg for another week or two until you've got at least 8 branch tips all around 12-14 inches tall. Then put the tomato cage on and flip them to 12/12. As soon as the the branches start to grow crazy fast I let the colas grow up inside the cage, and if any get too long I can start to wrap them around the side of the tomato cage.

 

[frankcooper]

im growing hydro so im not sure how exactly im going to tie them down. i've no soil to put a stake into.

 

[+ WitchDoctor +]

im growing hydro so im not sure how exactly im going to tie them down. i've no soil to put a stake into.

Ah, yea that won't work for you then. They've actually got this cool little thing at the hydro store by me. It's a 20 inch ring/rim on top and a 2' netting going down that wraps around it like a basketball net. It basically looks like you'd throw a basketball in it. But it hangs from above and sits over your plants the same was, and lets branches either grow through the netting or grow up through the ring.

 

[frankcooper]

there seems to be a lot of misuse of training terms. so far from watching video clips on youtube and general web research topping seems be when you either cut of the stem of the plant at least 2 nodes from the bottom, and its also when you cut the bud at the top. which one is correct?
now fimming seems to be similar to the second topping method but instead of cutting the whole of the bud you cut about 75% of it. how is this better than cutting off the full 100%?