trimming shade leaves???

I have been reading apparently contradictory statements concerning trimmming the shade leaves on growing plants...I have a very small cabinet (2.5' x 3') and currently 3 plants in the mid flowering stage...they are pretty close in there, and I thought it wise, after consultation w/several online sources, to trim some shade leaves...Then I started reading some contradictions, from Ed Rosenthal el al, suggesting the trimming has a price, oftentimes too steep of a price, ie, disease, stunting or even hermaphroditism...Nothing I can do now, having trimmed 2 dozen or so shade leaves, but in the future, should I clip these huge shade leaves, or leave them be??? :rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by WidowMaker

I have been reading apparently contradictory statements concerning trimmming the shade leaves on growing plants...I have a very small cabinet (2.5' x 3') and currently 3 plants in the mid flowering stage...they are pretty close in there, and I thought it wise, after consultation w/several online sources, to trim some shade leaves...Then I started reading some contradictions, from Ed Rosenthal el al, suggesting the trimming has a price, oftentimes too steep of a price, ie, disease, stunting or even hermaphroditism...Nothing I can do now, having trimmed 2 dozen or so shade leaves, but in the future, should I clip these huge shade leaves, or leave them be??? :rolleyes:

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I usually trim fan leaves cos im in the same boat as you with the space
ive found it doesnt seem to harm the plants or not that i can see.
i also trim alot of the leaves on the stalks it seems to produce alot flowers near where the leaf has been cut from.ED rosthensal did recommend it closet cultivator but it might only apply to certain set ups???????????
you might be right with the hemaphrodite bit cos i did get it a lot from the first couple of generations after i started pruning but there not that frequent now there on the 6th set of clones it seems to be dying out.good luck :D

Don't ever trim the shade leaves, they make the plants food so the bud can grow nice n big, and trimming may overstress the plant & turn it hermy.

:confused: :D a quote from jorge cervantes"contrary to unfounded rumors,hacking away at healthy plants will not make them produce more.cutting tops diffuses hormones and slows overall growth"jorge's Rx,grow america magazine. :rolleyes:

Dunno, I wouldn't prune or trim shade leaves, but topping the plant at the right time causes it to produce 2 colas at the top, not something I'd do if you got a lot of headspace in your grow room, but if you stealth growing in a small cupboard, or doing a scrog, topping is worth it, as I understand it (I'm a pretty novice grower myself, but I recon I've probably read a whole oxford english dictionarys worth of grow tips, it's often hard to tell the good advice from the bad, since a lot of authors seem to just recycle the work of earlier authors without actually testing themselves). Hopefully as time passes, more growers will post here, as the only real way to learn directly from folks who've tried it, experience beats 'book learnin' any day.

Oh, sorry, and I don't mean to contradict you, bonbon, just adding my take on it (I'm in a bit of a bolshy mood, so I've probably forgotten my socail graces)

greeting's boojum,I concur with you 100%,personal experience along with a little common sense are the definitive method's of learning.I happen to own quite a few book's from both of these renowned author's,(Rosenthal,Cervantes)and they advocate completely different method's,I tilt toward's Rosenthal's observation's,but i've gotten a good deal of info from the both of them,I guess that prove's that there are more than just two way's of doing thing's. :confused: :rolleyes: :D

greetings fellow growers..
ive only being growing a while myself and ive also found that a lot books give
totally different methods..
is their any authors you reccomend for begginers ive only read closet culticator by er and european cultivation by mel thomas
any other tips would be welcome... :cool: :)

insiders guide by mel franks is a real informative read and it cover's a lot of detail's.bonbon

i've read so much my eyes are popping out!!! :eek: te only thing i can say about the subject is learn from your own experiances...try ''ALL'' the methods and see which one works best for you...

Taking off sun leaves is not generally advised. Sun leaves are the energy source for plant growth. The exception is if a sun leaf can be removed to expose a growing shoot to direct light and IF plant nutrition is optimum.

hey peeples
I see the shadeleaves as solar panels. may be the safe amount to trim is goverened by the light available. logic tells me that a plant must be able to survive natural predators attacking them. if trimming of leaves is dictated by amount of light maybe different hemisphere strains react differantly to pruning.
I grow outdoor. I have found I can prune to make bushy plants but growth overall is definately retarded. Stress seems to govern hermaphoriditism 75%.The only safe way to take shadeleaves is till wait till budding occurs and remove yellow leaf- but by then its to late if your growing in ltd space. I prune very moderately from time to time seems to be okay. I'd suggest try strains with diff light requirements. Eventualy youll find a genetic match for the type of growing you require.
Dont beleive everything you read. Best to experiance.
peas

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Originally Posted by Boojum

Dunno, I wouldn't prune or trim shade leaves, but topping the plant at the right time causes it to produce 2 colas at the top, not something I'd do if you got a lot of headspace in your grow room, but if you stealth growing in a small cupboard, or doing a scrog, topping is worth it, as I understand it (I'm a pretty novice grower myself, but I recon I've probably read a whole oxford english dictionarys worth of grow tips, it's often hard to tell the good advice from the bad, since a lot of authors seem to just recycle the work of earlier authors without actually testing themselves). Hopefully as time passes, more growers will post here, as the only real way to learn directly from folks who've tried it, experience beats 'book learnin' any day.

Oh, sorry, and I don't mean to contradict you, bonbon, just adding my take on it (I'm in a bit of a bolshy mood, so I've probably forgotten my socail graces)

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tell me more about this forming 2 colas thing. it sounds like it mihgt work for me. PAZ :D

I always think of the sun leaves as solar panels and if you cut the the big solar panels off then somthing has to slow down .
I never done it coz i always had this thought and wouldn,t argue.
Mind i,ve heard of this many times b4 in different books and posts.

trim too many -no way for the plant to make it's food and too much stress they'll go hermy. trim too little - some of the buds wont develop as much as they could cuz of lack of sunlight.
just trim a few of them so the lower buds get a little more sunlight but not too much.. lol

The multiple colas thing is that if, while the plant is still vegging, you top off the growing tip of the plant, it will cause the plant to branch, and produce 2 growing tops. When you flower, each of the growing tops will form into a cola (group of buds), giving you two main colas instead of one, but they won't grow as big or fast, so it's more suited for growers with a limited growing height.

This is my first time growing , plus im 15 and dont reallly know alot bout prunning so cood you explain how 2 top the plant off.

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Originally Posted by Boojum

Don't ever trim the shade leaves, they make the plants food so the bud can grow nice n big, and trimming may overstress the plant & turn it hermy.

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i think i agree. ive trimmed plants mid flower and had some weird results compared to the same plants of a crop that havent been trimmed. slow growth and hermies, and some where seed pods appear at the junction of stems.

The only time I ever trim off any of them really is during the flowering. But very moderately. Usually one leave per plant every few days, and just the ones that are shading the buds from good light.

light, light, light, if light is geting to the bottem of your plant then your good , but i dont hesitate one second to grab the clippers durring flowering , the plants light needs decrease at an increasing rate and the need for the flower pedel to get the light this perduces nice big buds , sorround your plant in mylar or go down to home depo or wallmart , and pick up some florecent bulb mounts and put tubes that are made for groing ( not the floresent bulbs that usaliy go in them ) and put thease on the side of your plant to ad light , do not put them lower then half of the size of your plant tho , if you place them to low you will confuse your plant and stun it

man,......i always keep the fan leaves cut, this allows more light to come in...i've never had any problems,...however, look @ plants EVERYDAY....for males,...when one shows kill it....
rickone

hey guys,i thought you was supposed to trim off the shade leaves when growing indoors to let the light in on the whole plant, and leave them on outdoors to help fight off fung. bugs and so on? have run across that a few places,

if under the fan leaf you remove you have an equal amount of new growth surface area then I think it is hepfull to remove the older leaf

So what If The Leaves have holes or insect bites taken out of them?, I pruned Mine off but i would like to know what every one else does, I my self hate going to the woods and seeing Leaves with bites taken out of them, its ugly and in my own mind it makes me think im not doing a good job, But if it would do the plant better to leave wounded leaves on i would like to know Please.

Thinning:
This really only applies to outdoor
growers, but some indoor set-ups such as ScrOG,
SOG and BOG may need to be thinned.
Growers like to grow their plants in a
uniform condition. That is - growers like all
their plants to be the same height. That way we
perfectly arrange our light so that it is too
far away or close to the tops. If one plant is
racy then we would have to adjust the light to
suite that plant. This means that we may end up
with light gaps like the following.
-Distance from Plant A to light is 1 meter.
-Distance from Plant B to light is 0.5 meters.
-Distance from plant C to light is 8 inches.
In this case you could imagine the plants
in a slope shape in there grow environment.
Obviously we are going to be wasting light, not
to mention space on this set-up so we need to
prevent this slope from happening. That is
where thinning comes into play.
The reason for the slope or curve is because
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some plants might tend to be a bit racy. Some
of the plants will try to grow quicker than
others to try and receive more light. If this
happens the racy plant will cause the smaller
ones beside it to receive less light. To
control racy plants we use a process called
thinning.
If you discover a few racy plants then just
cut them down to the same level as the others
(called pruning) or remove them all together.
Once you have done this you will see all your
plants growing nicely along at the same level.
Now, do not throw away the cuttings from
the thinning before you read the next line. You
can clone these cuttings into new plants!
By the time you have finished your thinning
you will have an even grow area with some
clones that you can use to grow more bud.
Now the other thing to remember is that
some people may tend to thin the other way
round. That is - leaving the taller ones and
remove the smaller ones. Again in Cannabis
growing the taller plants are generally male
and the smaller ones are female if you have
started from seed. Do you want a garden full of
possible males?
During the thinning process you may want to
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tackle some dead leaves or leaves that have
some mould build up on them. Mould looks like a
rust or fluff on the leaves and will most of
the time spread to other parts of the plant. So
why not cut these away too while you thin your
grow area.
Thinning your grow makes it look nicer and
tidier and helps to improve your overall yield.

The 'fan' leaves that we all refer to have a whole host of other names on other plants and in other circles. The name 'sun' leaves is also common. We're dealing with a flower here. One of the reasons that flowers produce their flowering shoots on the intererctions of leaves and stems is the internal structure of the plant. It places the most important part of the plant in the most convienient place to obtain its nutrition. Simplified even further you are dealing with a small solar collector. Every square inch of photosynthetic tissue you remove is either a loss of energy input, or something that the plant has to work harder to grow. Plants arent growing with the thought of getting you nice big buds. They are growing to produce enough viable seeds to continue it's species. One plant that produces 100 seeds has more than done it's job. Removing large sugar factories (the leaves) is one certain way of slowing down the plant. Pick up a biology books and look up common plants. No disrepect to anyone, but the only time that the plant isn't really using that much sunlight is once the large fan leaves start to yellow and drop the week before harvest or so. That isn't to let light in to the flowers, they are nearly if not totally mature. It's simply because they aren't needed anymore. If you look at any plant in nature, they do not grow unnecessary structures, it is a tremendous waste of energy. Nature is incredibly efficient, and even though most of us are going to very unnatural steps to produce our fine products, it's still a plant and follows those rules.

Congratulations! You've officially dug up the oldest thread: 2004!!!!!!

Stinky or another mod, maybe a sticky about how it's bad form to resurrect dead threads just to get your post-count up or am I just being too picky?

Happens quite often, lol.

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Originally Posted by MVilleToker

This is my first time growing , plus im 15 and dont reallly know alot bout prunning so cood you explain how 2 top the plant off.

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surely your too young for this kind of site no ?:eek::bnd2::icon506::admin1:

15 years old in 2004 would make him 19. This thread is ancient and even has a discussion about resurrecting old threads in it!

doh! my bad must stop smoking and reading threads @ the same time lol :jointsmile:

I am glad to read this and while there are so many different ways of doing it and on my first grow of WW, I did allot of trimming, so I cannot have a way point to say they grew more or less.

The Genetics thing and nature makes allot of sense to me, so I believe on this 32 PPP I have going (one month hydro from seed, they are about 12", some slower, but the light is not the problem) and 12 Supergirl, I think i will go with only trimming the bottom leaves in veg stage as they clearly go yellow and are not producing as nature turns them.

Another great learn from a great set of peeps. Thanks for the info.

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Originally Posted by stinkyattic

15 years old in 2004 would make him 19. This thread is ancient and even has a discussion about resurrecting old threads in it!

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So he'll be 23 now? Wow.

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Originally Posted by Sp00ner

Nature is incredibly efficient, and even though most of us are going to very unnatural steps to produce our fine products, it's still a plant and follows those rules.

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True.

No need to trim, just keep the used up dead ones that fall out of the medium. The plants will poise themselves for best absorption and protection. Its like the stretching thing, complete bs, other than the plant knows what to do to put itself in the best possible position, if its a bad one its telling you your garden sucks and they want something better,haha

Quote:

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Originally Posted by WidowMaker

I have been reading apparently contradictory statements concerning trimmming the shade leaves on growing plants...I have a very small cabinet (2.5' x 3') and currently 3 plants in the mid flowering stage...they are pretty close in there, and I thought it wise, after consultation w/several online sources, to trim some shade leaves...Then I started reading some contradictions, from Ed Rosenthal el al, suggesting the trimming has a price, oftentimes too steep of a price, ie, disease, stunting or even hermaphroditism...Nothing I can do now, having trimmed 2 dozen or so shade leaves, but in the future, should I clip these huge shade leaves, or leave them be??? :rolleyes:

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Never cut shade/fan leaves I did an experiment on this subject in my early grow days, I had some bubble gum cuttings that I had let veg to a nice size they were about 3ft high very bushy and fairly uniform in growth and pattern I decided to prune the best looking one and stripped off most of the fan leaves can't remember exact yields but I can remember all the none pruned plants yielding significantly more than the poor old pruned girl, needless to say I never stripped the fan leaves off a plant again.

Trimming lower leaves and branches where the light cannot reach in the 2nd-3rd week of flowering is good practice or alternatively you can leave them, flower the top half of your plant then trim that off to harvest, then finish flowering the lower half of your plant, I found the lower bud seemed to be better in taste than the top bud:stoned: