Experiment with your plants its fun!
sometimes you win sometimes you lose, if you are not an imbecile hopefully you will learn from the experience
from my own experience defoliation does not always improve things, it is strain/pheno dependent on weather the overall yield / colas quility will improve
i tend NOT to remove leaves from pure indica/afghan types, or at least do so much more cautiously as this has resulted in distorted re-growth with some strains
for me personally defoliation is a form of canopy management, i know others think it works regardless, this in not my view
it can help to produce more bud over the whole crop of plants that are very close together
i also tuck the leaves under with some strains rather than remove them, other strains like the sweet tooth pheno i had, do not seem to need very many leaves at all
some plants will naturally make lots of leaves, others normally sativa dominated plants can produce colas with very few leaves, i see removing leaves from more leafy strains
as a quick fix to what could be found naturally among other pheno's of the same strain anyway
to me it seems silly to think each plant would grow naturally indoor producing the "perfect" amount of leaves, plants indoor normally grow in an awkward shape because of the light only coming from above and not having a more balanced light spread all around them, like they would grow naturally outdoor, in the more xmas tree shape
indoor they grow top heavy because of this, forming a canopy of leaves is not helpful in my opinion , i want a canopy of colas that have no light restriction to the middle and lower nodes
which will also form large colas with the right strain
genetically a given plant could produce more or less leaves than its sisters, breeding can be used to produce plants that produce few leaves which is often a desirable trait
those against experimenting seem to be saying that the plant must be left to grow naturally with the amount of leaves that it was given genetically since it must be "perfect"
to start with
is the sister plant that grows more leaves naturally better because it has more leaves ?
is the sister plant that naturally grows less leaves weaker in some way, simply because it has less leaves ?
overall it is much easier to follow the guidelines from growbooks, and other such guru's a bit like following a recipe from a cook book, this way you do not need to think for yourself or take any risks
personally i find this approach boring and stagnant
found a few more pics, lol,
this is 4 plants on the opposite side of the room very close spacing, with many leaves removed at 3-4 weeks flower
peace