importance of fan leaves

rollingstoned1988

rollingstoned1988

Member
hi every1 , i have 3 white widows in my waterfarm al 3 week into flowerin ....
Question is do i take any fan leaves of so that light penetrates deeper into the plant or do i leave them all on ? i was told by another fairly experianced grower to strip the lot except the top few sets....

any help or info on that matter would be greatly appreciated and il giv you reps :joint:
 
NLXSK1

NLXSK1

Well-Known Member
The fan leaves are the power generators of the plant.

There are certain trimming methods such as lollipopping that would require the removal of the fan leaves but typically this will slow down the growth of the plant as you are taking its factories away from it.
 
/b/

/b/

Active Member
NLXSK1 said:
The fan leaves are the power generators of the plant.

There are certain trimming methods such as lollipopping that would require the removal of the fan leaves but typically this will slow down the growth of the plant as you are taking its factories away from it.
Click to expand...
Yep, pretty much.
 
TheDude0007

TheDude0007

Active Member
NLXSK1 said:
The fan leaves are the power generators of the plant.

There are certain trimming methods such as lollipopping that would require the removal of the fan leaves but typically this will slow down the growth of the plant as you are taking its factories away from it.
Click to expand...
I would have to agree.

I do however remove fan leaves, as long as I leave the ones at the top of each shoot. So I am really asking, should I not do this? I try and trim away quite a few leaves always leaving to big fan leaves at the very top.
 
rollingstoned1988

rollingstoned1988

Member
thanks evry1 for the advice , so id be ok just removin the very lowest scabbiest fan leaves ?
i suppose they wont be doin much with hardly any light penetrating that low anyways

thanks again for the help dudes
 
B

burninjay

Active Member
I remove all of my fan leaves..... at harvest time. Anything sooner than that, and you are limiting the plant's ability to synthesize it's food.

Leaves don't use up precious energy, they provide it. And leaves don't block light, they absorb it to produce that energy. If a leaf is non-productive, the plant will recycle the nutrients in that leaf and cast it off all by itself. Just let it grow.
 
TheDude0007

TheDude0007

Active Member
burninjay said:
I remove all of my fan leaves..... at harvest time. Anything sooner than that, and you are limiting the plant's ability to synthesize it's food.

Leaves don't use up precious energy, they provide it. And leaves don't block light, they absorb it to produce that energy. If a leaf is non-productive, the plant will recycle the nutrients in that leaf and cast it off all by itself. Just let it grow.
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Does a bud that sat behind loads of leaves have the same amount of crystals and strenght as a bud that have been getting full light on it? If yes how do you explain that the bud at the top of the plant is normally more potent.

I have tried both aproaches. I did not trim a thing and I have trimmed loads of a plant, always leaving the main fan leaves. I find that the lower buds are bigger, taste better and are much more potent if I give them access to light. But maybe that was because of other factors. I am still undecided, so I vallue your opinion.
 
louisc

louisc

Active Member
yup, taking lower fans off a healthy plant
only encourages branching, used to top
now my branches look like colas from
nipping fans asap, if it's lush veg trim it

current 3 month old CFL widow ghetto groView attachment 999870
 
Brick Top

Brick Top

New Member
Fan leaves are not only a plant's largest most efficient solar collectors they are also factories where sugars are produced and warehouses where food/energy is stored for use during hours of darkness. During hours of darkness plants allocate increased amounts of energy for growth and also for THC production (when in flower of course) over the amount of energy allocated for those function during hours of light. Everyone should want as much stored energy in their plants as possible so those functions can operate at their maximum efficiency.

Until fairly well along in flower plants will attempt to replace any lost healthy foliage. For each leaf or branch removed the plant will allocate energy to replace what was lost elsewhere on the plant. That of course means that when someone removes leaves or branches thinking by doing so they can redirect the plant's energy to be used the way they want it to be used what will actually happen is the plant will attempt to recover what was lost and other functions will be deprived of some energy.

Someone cannot force a plant to allocate it's energy the way the person wants it to be used.

People look at plants and say to themselves, well the plant has 'X' amount of energy and those darn big fan leaves have to use a lot of energy to remain alive so I will remove them and more of the 'X' amount of energy will then be used for bud growth. Well once you remove the leaves 'X' amount of energy then drops to 'P' amount of total energy to use because the plant cannot absorb and use as many light rays.

So now your total amount of energy is down from 'X' to 'P' and then thanks to removing the leaves the plant takes some of the remaining reduced amount of total energy, 'P', and allocates it for replacing the foliage that was removed leaving the rest of the plant to rely on only 'K' amount of energy.

The belief in trimming plants to force them to use their energy for bud growth is based in flawed logic and not in plant facts. At some point in time someone who knew nothing at all about plants connected dots that really do not connect and failed to see they did not create an accurate picture by connecting the wrong dots.
 
Trollin

Trollin

Active Member
Brick Top said:
Fan leaves are not only a plant's largest most efficient solar collectors they are also factories where sugars are produced and warehouses where food/energy is stored for use during hours of darkness. During hours of darkness plants allocate increased amounts of energy for growth and also for THC production (when in flower of course) over the amount of energy allocated for those function during hours of light. Everyone should want as much stored energy in their plants as possible so those functions can operate at their maximum efficiency.

Until fairly well along in flower plants will attempt to replace any lost healthy foliage. For each leaf or branch removed the plant will allocate energy to replace what was lost elsewhere on the plant. That of course means that when someone removes leaves or branches thinking by doing so they can redirect the plant's energy to be used the way they want it to be used what will actually happen is the plant will attempt to recover what was lost and other functions will be deprived of some energy.

Someone cannot force a plant to allocate it's energy the way the person wants it to be used.

People look at plants and say to themselves, well the plant has 'X' amount of energy and those darn big fan leaves have to use a lot of energy to remain alive so I will remove them and more of the 'X' amount of energy will then be used for bud growth. Well once you remove the leaves 'X' amount of energy then drops to 'P' amount of total energy to use because the plant cannot absorb and use as many light rays.

So now your total amount of energy is down from 'X' to 'P' and then thanks to removing the leaves the plant takes some of the remaining reduced amount of total energy, 'P', and allocates it for replacing the foliage that was removed leaving the rest of the plant to rely on only 'K' amount of energy.

The belief in trimming plants to force them to use their energy for bud growth is based in flawed logic and not in plant facts. At some point in time someone who knew nothing at all about plants connected dots that really do not connect and failed to see they did not create an accurate picture by connecting the wrong dots.
Click to expand...
Well played sir
 
Anonymouse

Anonymouse

Active Member
I'm a believer in doing almost anything you want to your plant while it's vegging, but after flowering I never remove things more than a simple tug to test for dying leaves etc...
 
louisc

louisc

Active Member
brick top, dont the stalks have straw like tubes
that feed certain leaves or branches, u cut
a leaf, that tube is still flowing nutes so it sprouts
a branch, mine look like a 3 ft xmas trees, fully decorated
in white caus more light gets thru ...

but what ever works for ya
 
R

rob dos

Member
Only healthy leaves contribute to a plant. I look for the slightest excuse to remove a leaf or a leaf cluster. A torn
leaf, a leaf with a spot on it, a leaf that is naturally turning yellow are reasons enough for me to make use of them until
harvest time. I appreciate the notion that leaving plants alone is a good thing. May be, if I get a large enough crop
of buds, I will.
 
EagleEyeHamThrust

EagleEyeHamThrust

Active Member
Rob did say it well. I run a scrog, and if there's a fan leaf below the screen, I get rid of it because all it's doing is waiting to die and form mold. If there's a leaf that's got signs of nute or light burn, I get rid of it immediately. Again, because of mold issues. And lastly, I'll trim some fans if things are getting overgrown in my cabinet. Lightly pruning is fine. Removing more than 10-15 percent of your fans would probably have a big impact on the plant's health.
 
louisc

louisc

Active Member
heres what cutting fans does 4 me,
like my cola tree ? , u can't even see the main
one, about 3 ft in diameter 3 ft high
 

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