Do I prune these fan leafs?

Merkn4aSquirtn

Well-Known Member
You can if you want.
She’ll respond back looking pissed after a few hours.
If it were me, I’d grab the top of that bitch and pull her down to the side a bit to open up more light.
Basically a late lst.
 

20am20

Member
Thanks everyone for the replies, Ill take your advise and leave it be! Ill post a few more with the light off.
 

JacFlasche

Member
Interesting question. Many will tell you yes. I say not to. I do believe that the entire idea of defoliation will be debunked if anyone ever does a properly designed side by side study in a double blind test.
IMHO pruning should be done minimally only to increase air circulation and to rid the plant of some of the first few branches that will grow long but produce little worthwhile flowers, unless one is growing outside with space all around the plant -- then I would not even prune these. Many people seem to think that plate leaves become a negative as far as bud production is concerned, as they get older. I do not hold this view.

See this article for botanical logic.

https://www.cocoforcannabis.com/community/photons_corner/to-defoliate-or-not-to-defoliate/

The article is pretty clear about how the rationalizations that people come up with about why pruning is good for bud production are incorrect. The sole objective of a female plant is to produce as many seeds as possible. The plant knows what it is doing, (well not really but natural selection over millions of years has made it the equivalent of a genius at optimizing its reactions and structure.) The long and short of it is that plate leave send growth energy to the flowers at a higher rate than other smaller leaves, and when their efficiency drops off to the point were they become a drag on flower production, the plant sucks nutrition from them and they dry up and die. Though if you have leaves that have light burn, they will become very inefficient but still not fall off. Possibly because in nature this is not a possibility so no adaptation has ever occurred. So if I had leaves that were clearly burned by light and had turned yellow and brown but continued to hold on strong, as real light burned leaves do, I would prune them off -- IF they were shading other more viable leaves.

IMHO pruning is a tool that should be minimized as much as possible.
 

Star Dog

Well-Known Member
It appears to be well debated, personally I wouldn't touch them they store food, transpire water, oxygen absorb Co2 and gather light.
 

Merkn4aSquirtn

Well-Known Member
Here’s a good question for the non defoliators.
In flower, if you have fans covering some of the lower bud sites, when you remove the fan from above it, if you even remove it, can you not tell that the lower buds can mature along with the rest of the plant?
If I have a fan above a bud. That bud grows slower and it’s less dense than the top canopy buds.
When I get rid of the shade.. I can tell a difference in that lower bud just after a few days.
I know this doesn’t relate to OPs post, kinda but just wanted to hear others thoughts on that
 

20am20

Member
Thats what I noticed on my first grow, 2 plants one I trimmed one side of blocking small bud leaves off, the other I didnt. Bud sites "seemed" to grow bigger on the side I trimmed off.
 

JacFlasche

Member
Here’s a good question for the non defoliators.
In flower, if you have fans covering some of the lower bud sites, when you remove the fan from above it, if you even remove it, can you not tell that the lower buds can mature along with the rest of the plant?
If I have a fan above a bud. That bud grows slower and it’s less dense than the top canopy buds.
When I get rid of the shade.. I can tell a difference in that lower bud just after a few days.
I know this doesn’t relate to OPs post, kinda but just wanted to hear others thoughts on that
My lower buds mature along with the rest of the plant without pruning. If the article I have quoted and papers he refers to are correct, then pruning is an over-all negative when done to allow more light to reach lower buds. I cannot speak to your perceptions, but have to rely on the abundant tests that have been done, and they indicate that at the very least, any significant pruning will lead to a delay in the ultimate floral expression and possibly a loss in total flower weight. I do suspect that as this article indicates, that the reason people perceive an increase in flower expression is not what they think, and that in the over-all production of flowers and time considerations it is a negative. However I an not married to this view and if there is any viable evidence to the contrary that is not anecdotal, or ill-conceived in the experimental design, I would appreciate a link to it.
 

Flowki

Well-Known Member
Here’s a good question for the non defoliators.
In flower, if you have fans covering some of the lower bud sites, when you remove the fan from above it, if you even remove it, can you not tell that the lower buds can mature along with the rest of the plant?
If I have a fan above a bud. That bud grows slower and it’s less dense than the top canopy buds.
When I get rid of the shade.. I can tell a difference in that lower bud just after a few days.
I know this doesn’t relate to OPs post, kinda but just wanted to hear others thoughts on that
If everything in the grow is running close to perfect the whole time (and that's a lot of things other than light) lower buds that are not in light suprisingly mature and dense up. How much so I don't know, but you'd struggle to tell the difference ''if'' mixed.
 
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