Do you really need the big fan leaves wifh an inside grow?

[charlestonchunk]

HEY MYOB. THERE IS NOTHING THAT HAS NOT BEEN POSTED. dO RESURCH, DRAW IT OUT. yOU WILL BE SUCCESSFULL IF YOU LISTEN TO THE ELDERS AND DONT FUCK WITH THEM, THEY WILL GROW, ALL THINGS LIKE PH BEING EQUAL. fIRST GROW, I RECOMENT GOOD LIGHT POTTING SOIL AND WICK FEEDING. yOU CANT GO WROPNG. hUGE BUDS....sorry for caps lock

 

[Nullis]

How eloquent.

 

[MYOB]

HEY MYOB. THERE IS NOTHING THAT HAS NOT BEEN POSTED. dO RESURCH, DRAW IT OUT. yOU WILL BE SUCCESSFULL IF YOU LISTEN TO THE ELDERS AND DONT FUCK WITH THEM, THEY WILL GROW, ALL THINGS LIKE PH BEING EQUAL. fIRST GROW, I RECOMENT GOOD LIGHT POTTING SOIL AND WICK FEEDING. yOU CANT GO WROPNG. hUGE BUDS....sorry for caps lock

I don't even know how to respond.

 

[MYOB]

From what I've researched the top of the plant gets a lot of the plants resources. You can see a similar thing in nature the majority of growth is at the top of the plants and trees. It makes sense for pollination to have many pistils high up the plant to capture pollen.
the fan leafs are huge on most plants. The surface area of one fan leaf is probly 2x or 3x more than the tri-leaflets that surround the buds on most plants. They do serve there purpose for a majority of flowering until they become yellow and start falling off allowing more light to reach the buds.
when I first started growing I went trim happy on a plant it wasn't good. Ever since then I've never really messed with trimming in flower. I trim lower branches and sucker branches in veg, but I never really mess with trimming once she goes in flower.

Thanks

I understand apical dominance in growth stages. In flowering, do the flowers draw their energy from fan leaves on the plant or do they directly convert light into energy via photosynthesis themselves?

Does the proximity of a fan leaf determine which flower it will "support"? So if I cut a fan leaf on a branch, will the flower on that branch suffer or will it manifest as an overall reduction in flowering?

Would flowers grow just the same if you covered them all with opaque material and only left the fan leaves to absorb light?

Why do the lowest leaves on a plant start to die off as the plant gets larger?

Why does "LST" work? You are exposing lower shoots to light and they grow up like main branches. Seems like more light to a particular area equals more growth. If I cut a fan leaf off to expose a growth shoot to direct light, that shoot grows faster. Why?

When taking cuttings, it is often advised to leave little leaf material so the plant can focus on growing roots. So you are sacrificing one growth aspect for another. Kind of like cutting fan leaves that are blocking light from growth shoots.

If the leaves fall off during flowering so the buds can get more light, why not help them along a bit? A plants goal in nature isnt to have "big buds". it is to get pollinated and produce seeds. It is trying to grow bigger than the others so it has a better chance.

The questions are somewhat rhetorical. Just trying to get some questioning happening.

To me, it makes sense to prune. Not defoliate the entire plant, but selectively prune to expose the areas with most potential to maximum available light. Also to promote good air circulation.

 

[Nullis]

My thinking is that in nature, the plants sole purpose is reproducing. It grows how it does in order to have the best chance at getting pollinated. Marijuana growers DO NOT want that. They want to keep the plant from doing what it is made to do. So while fan leaves may be there for a reason in nature, that reason isn't to get big, dense flowers with swollen trich covered false seed pods. It is trying to do one thing and we are trying to get it to do another.

Yes it is. Dense flowers\swollen seed pods covered in trichomes are there to catch pollen. The trichomes themselves and allelochemicals they produce, whether that is a matter of protection from harmful sun rays, to repel or protect against insects, make it unsuitable for consumption by herbivores\predators or even as an attractant to encourage humans\animals to spread the seed as a matter of wide-spread debate. But the calyx itself, or more importantly the stigmas protruding from it are there to catch pollen. Indoors we are only tricking the plant into doing what it does do in nature, only ensuring the outcome that suits our needs. The plant is growing just the same; does she know she'll never be pollinated? Do we know for sure she didn't? Not until we harvest and go thru every single calyx for any signs of seed development.

 

[Nullis]

Thanks

I understand apical dominance in growth stages. In flowering, do the flowers draw their energy from fan leaves on the plant or do they directly convert light into energy via photosynthesis themselves?

Does the proximity of a fan leaf determine which flower it will "support"? So if I cut a fan leaf on a branch, will the flower on that branch suffer or will it manifest as an overall reduction in flowering?

Would flowers grow just the same if you covered them all with opaque material and only left the fan leaves to absorb light?

Why do the lowest leaves on a plant start to die off as the plant gets larger?

Why does "LST" work? You are exposing lower shoots to light and they grow up like main branches. Seems like more light to a particular area equals more growth. If I cut a fan leaf off to expose a growth shoot to direct light, that shoot grows faster. Why?

When taking cuttings, it is often advised to leave little leaf material so the plant can focus on growing roots. So you are sacrificing one growth aspect for another. Kind of like cutting fan leaves that are blocking light from growth shoots.

If the leaves fall off during flowering so the buds can get more light, why not help them along a bit? A plants goal in nature isnt to have "big buds". it is to get pollinated and produce seeds. It is trying to grow bigger than the others so it has a better chance.

The questions are somewhat rhetorical. Just trying to get some questioning happening.

To me, it makes sense to prune. Not defoliate the entire plant, but selectively prune to expose the areas with most potential to maximum available light. Also to promote good air circulation.

Indoor lighting generally doesn't have the over-all coverage\intensity that the sun provides outdoors. Indoor lighting is basically much more susceptible to the inverse square law. Just think of the sheer scale of the intensity of light provided by the sun; the light hitting the floor coming from a 600 watt grow bulb five or six feet away pales in comparison to what is shining on the ground of Earth in full the sun after the journey through space, even below sea-level.

Removing low branches is common indoors and that isn't an really issue. You could also simply introduce some side-lighting. Indoors plants are best kept at certain heights depending on the lighting being used. Fan leaves are the most efficient photosynthesizers, they collect the most usable light to convert into energy; they have nutrients, primary and secondary metabolites- compounds the plant already put energy into assembling which it would send elsewhere if it needed to.

 

[thinn]

Alright! I get to quote the cannabis bible again! I love having this digital copy on my phone! This thing is really coming in handy! I still pull some leaves off occasionally but i try and refrain from doing so.

 

[MYOB]

Yes it is. Dense flowers\swollen seed pods covered in trichomes are there to catch pollen. The trichomes themselves and allelochemicals they produce, whether that is a matter of protection from harmful sun rays, to repel or protect against insects, make it unsuitable for consumption by herbivores\predators or even as an attractant to encourage humans\animals to spread the seed as a matter of wide-spread debate. But the calyx itself, or more importantly the stigmas protruding from it are there to catch pollen. Indoors we are only tricking the plant into doing what it does do in nature, only ensuring the outcome that suits our needs. The plant is growing just the same; does she know she'll never be pollinated? Do we know for sure she didn't? Not until we harvest and go thru every single calyx for any signs of seed development.

Right... but the stigma would catch pollen from nearby flowering males. This would happen early in the flowering season, before they had a chance to become coated in pollen catching trichomes and before the calyxs were able to swell and serve are even more surface area for trichomes. They would be pollinated and focus on seed production. The pistils would shrivel and seeds would make up the bulk of the flowers weight.

Youre right, we are "tricking" the plant into doing something to meet our needs . Our goals aren't the same, so growth strategies aren't the same. Cutting fan leaves is "tricking" the plant into shedding its fan leaves early and focusing its energy on bud development? Or maybe tricking it into thinking it lost a leaf to some natural phenomenon? you can bet some undergrowth is going to fill that void and utilize the sunlight.

I think there is a happy medium. I trim or prune. I dont chop her up. I dont think leaving every single fan leaf is necessary or even beneficial. I dont think cutting all the fan leaves to expose just buds is beneficial either. I try to maximise flower production efficiency while maintaining a healthy plant. That means good airflow, good light penetration/distribution and a healthy balance of fan leaves and flowers.

I really dont know though. Thats why good discussions are beneficial. Better than "dude, leafs are like solar panels. I read it from some dude with like 500 posts"

I have sativas that dont need pruning because they allow for plenty of light deep into the plant. Indicas where its literally dark under the canopy. I have just done what I think is best from what I understand about how plants grow.

 

[budman111]

HEY MYOB. THERE IS NOTHING THAT HAS NOT BEEN POSTED. dO RESURCH, DRAW IT OUT. yOU WILL BE SUCCESSFULL IF YOU LISTEN TO THE ELDERS AND DONT FUCK WITH THEM, THEY WILL GROW, ALL THINGS LIKE PH BEING EQUAL. fIRST GROW, I RECOMENT GOOD LIGHT POTTING SOIL AND WICK FEEDING. yOU CANT GO WROPNG. hUGE BUDS....sorry for caps lock

Please remove head from ass.

 

[jcmjrt]

something I have wondered...

Why do buds at the top that are exposed to more light get larger and denser than those at the bottom of the plant? Is this a matter of apical dominance more so than exposure to light?

It would be easy to do some experimentation on your own to see what is what. Side lighting lower down on the plant - do the buds develop more? There are many variations.

If you are genuinely interested in how plants generally work, then there are many good botany books available as well; you can be the expert and answer challenges from newbs with citations in hand. If you want a layman's level book then Botany for Gardeners by Brian Capon is good and if you wish to explore more at the budding botanists level try Botany An introduction to Plant Biology by James D. Mauseth (not an easy read but pretty thorough and sets you up to really understand what is happening with your plants).

 

[Bigby]

Please remove head from ass.

Help him out eh, all that shouting would have dried it right out. He's gonna need plenty of spit to lube it up and let it slip out again.

 

[Dannysayo]

Im glad this post took off, plenty of useful info!