trim fan leaves during flowering?

just want to know your guys opinion on cutting fan leaves during flowering to let light to lower buds?

Very heavily debated subject...for myself I would never take off a leaf that isn't about to just fall naturally.

I leave them on too - remove when they are yellow. Fan leaves use the nutrients, then turn yellow, and eventually turn crispy and brown.

I have been reading on this site, the many different versions of removing leaves and I'll tell you its a touchy subject. This is my opinion. I'll try to shed some light on the subject. Removing leaves for light to the lower buds...myth, leaving all the leaves on a plant is better than removing....myth, removing all the big leaves for added energy...myth, removing leaves will decrease your yield...myth, plants need all their leaves...myth, plants will get rid of leaves it no longer requires...myth. Indoor growing is totally different then growing outside, this is the biggest reason for a different approach. Greenhouses would be a little closer to an indoor grow, if you were to look at work habits and practices. Generally removing leaves is for better air circulation and flow...that's pretty much it! Mind you there are practices for cannabis that manipulate the plant to produce its full potential where the grower desires...lollipopping is just one. Removing leaves for additional light will not make them little buds any bigger and could possibly lessen your total yield. Hope this helped...good luck

One way to do it, is instead of removing the whole leaf, is to cut it in half if it is a large fan leaf. The cut leaf will still produce, while allowing more light to penetrate to the lower bud sites. I personally believe that the more lower leaves that are exposed to light will compensate for the energy lost by removing the upper leaf. I like more light to penetrate, but that has a lot to do with the way I grow, which is very tight. I think I get better lower bud development by trimming. Peace

According to the inverse square law, any leaf that is say 2 feet from the light source will receive four times less light then leaves close to the light..
So by removing upper fan leaves in an attempt to get more light to lower leaves, you just cut down the effectiveness of the light according to the inverse square law, the leaves at the top of the plant receive more light and therefore photosynthesis more..
Cutting of top leaves to get more light to the bottom of the plant is basically cutting off your nose to spite your face..

If you allow colas to become shaded they will not reach their full potential
the light needs to hit all of the leaves, this includes the small leaves, buds that grow in shade often mature early they appear light green or discolored
the pistils retract very early in the absence of light, this often leads to some self pollinating and happens quite often on lower shaded branches

having the light only hit the large fan leaves while the center of the plant remains shaded is not a good idea
removing some leaves can help open things up, but there are better ways imo
i do remove some leaves, but find bending out the branches more helpful overall when it comes to allowing light to penetrate
but this requires space to bend the branches into and thats not always possible
removing some leaves to create better airflow around the canopy is a must imo when growing in tight spaces

having seen the speed at which leaves can regrow, i also think its better to remove all of the half dead leaves so they will be replaced with new fresh leaves
i try to only keep fully healthy leaves on my plants, i also tend to grow fairly large plants so they can afford to lose a few leaves
smaller plants that have lots of leaves removed would suffer imo

peace

Myth buster above speaks a lil' bull, basically ur saying the leaves aren't necessary then, so why do they have them?
If leaves made no difference wether u left them on or not, over time the plant would have lost them.

leaves are important, don't listen to jonnyseed420, a completely stripped plant will not produce the same as if it was left, so that's ur myth busted!

removing leaves will lose yield, if u take too many off
And leaving leaves on is obviously better then stripping a plant.

your post doesn't even make sense, on one hand u say removing leaves increases yield is a myth then say leaving all the leaves on wont increase yield, has to be one or the other bro, otherwise what's the point of doing anything, you would just let the plant grow.

fact is removing some leaves and branches is good and will increase yield and airflow. And when I mean yield, it may not necessarily be more weight but quality of buds are better. No popcorn shite.

Same noob made the thread asking if he should flush or not.

racerboy71 said:

According to the inverse square law, any leaf that is say 2 feet from the light source will receive four times less light then leaves close to the light..
So by removing upper fan leaves in an attempt to get more light to lower leaves, you just cut down the effectiveness of the light according to the inverse square law, the leaves at the top of the plant receive more light and therefore photosynthesis more..
Cutting of top leaves to get more light to the bottom of the plant is basically cutting off your nose to spite your face..

Click to expand...

That's it. Why would you debate after reading this. SCIENCE!

Thanks man, instinct is good but backingit up with logic always makes you feel better.

I might cut a couple of leaves but never would with a "fat" one. If cutting a small to medium size leave will allow a lot more light penetration to lower buds i might cut it off. But at the end of the day if my training was done proper, 9 out of 10 time i'd rather cut the lower bud (sucker) than the higher leave (solar panel).

Peace!

im scrogging and ive removed some of the largest leaves, just at preflower stage. there are PLENTY of other leaves for "solar panels" just removing 4 or 5 large ones has made no difference other than letting light through better. most of them were technically under the net, but as they were so large they were either on top of future bud sites, or just dangling down. i removed some which were going pale and had dead spots/edges which i believe were due to such a lack of light, but i also removed a small number of perfectly healthy leaves too. they were huge. like size of my hand! thats on my photo plant. on my autos i have only trimmed below the net, leaves which werent receiving light anyway. it also helps circulation and reduces chances of bud rot and mould from what i understand...... some are for it, some are against it, its all about your exact situation really.... im growing on a balcony, and have a mix of autos in autopots with coco and a photo in biobizz light mix, all 4 under the same net so they are starting to impede on each others space a bit....anyway dont listen to me its only my 2nd grow and i dont know shit. my plant hasnt died so im gd

Well i decided to take one for the team and let the plant tell us. She is currently on day 2 of week 4 of bloom. On the edge of a 1000w hps in a raptor hood. Hopefully the pictures will upload. The strain is the Ultimate from Dutch Passion from seed. Im using Ionic Bloom nutes for soil and Beastie Bloomz from Fox Farm for another week.

Sorry posted before all the pictures uploaded. Ill continue to post as the flowering progresses. I am medical and compliant. Blah blah blah......

I took most of the fan leaves off a Quantium Kush in a batch of 7 on week 4. it was the lowest yeilder of the 7 clones all grown the same way. so ima gonna leave those leaves on until 1-2 days before harvest.

racerboy71 said:

According to the inverse square law, any leaf that is say 2 feet from the light source will receive four times less light then leaves close to the light..
So by removing upper fan leaves in an attempt to get more light to lower leaves, you just cut down the effectiveness of the light according to the inverse square law, the leaves at the top of the plant receive more light and therefore photosynthesis more..
Cutting of top leaves to get more light to the bottom of the plant is basically cutting off your nose to spite your face..

Click to expand...

This was the best reason I've seen so far, thank you very much I was on the fence about this!