Do you really need to trim?

So my buddy says that you need to pick off the leaves on the plants every so often, his reasoning is (1) that it helps to push more of the energy into the buds instead of the leaves and (2) because the lower leaves aren't receiving full sunlight and are a waste of the plants energy.
I can understand picking off dying leaves but isn't this just causing the plant to put more energy into regrowing the leaves? I've also heard that you want a lot of sunlight to get to the buds so is that a reason to pick off the leaves?
Thanks Thanks Thanks

i don't know. i only pick off the ones that are yellow and are going to fall off anyway.

the type of trimming ur talkin bout comes with time... get a few grows under your belt first.. for now just pick of the dead and burnt ones... but yess you can train your plants to grow and yeild more by pruning.. but you dont have to...... after you master cloning then talking pruning.. then if you have 6 + fems pruning up 1 wont mind fuck you as bad ....

Don't be scared, get those dying leaves off, just leave the rest alone!

the buds don't need the light, it's the leaves that make the food and sugars that grow buds..

build a happy canopy of healthy leaves and you will have a happy plant that grows nice buds..
yes, it's true that buds at the lower part of a plant don't receive as much light as the ones at the top of a plant due to the nature of light, which fades very fast over distances.. so by removing any healthy leaves from the top of a plant which are receiving the most light, therefore doing the most work for the plant, only to try and get more light to the lower sections of a plant, you're really shooting yourself in the foot so to speak..
don't remove any leaves during the grows, and in fact, simply concentrate all of your efforts on keeping all of the leaves that you have nice and healthy throughout the grow, you're plants will be their healthiest, and therefore yield the best they can..

leaves are the power houses of plants.. they take in light and convert it to food and sugars via photosynthesis.. leaves grow buds, not the other way around..

Firstly, I wouldn't "pick off" any leaves live or dead, rather cut them off and leave about 1" of their stem. It is less traumatic to the plant as a whole when you don't cut right at the main stem. I agree that I'd get some grows under my belt, for now, only trim the yellow leaves. Otherwise the plant will devote energy towards healing the leaves that are yellowing. You won't do any damage if you do it this way. Later on, you'll learn the art of pruning, that is, selective removal of leaves that are too low for adequate light, block bud sites, and a means to train the plant to produce more sites to grow those delicious buds...
It is normal for leaves to yellow as time passes, it is a simple matter of upwards growth. It should start at the bottom (oldest) and work its' way up. If you see a lot of yellow, be sure it isn't something else, like weakness in the nutrients/soil (IDK what method your grow is) or at the worst, pathogens or insects! Lots of information here; spend some time reading all the older stuff in journals too. Pretty much any question ever asked here, has already been answered. Good luck to you and hope this helps...

No. You can just leave all the leaves, the good, the bad and the ugly. The plant will get rid of them when it's ready. Can you? Yes. I remove all fan leaves that are less then 50% green that are on the lower half of the plant, less then 25% green for the upper half. Fan leaves are what take in the light so you don't want to get rid of too many.
As for 'pushing energy into the buds' that's called pruning, and it works. I did not prune until my 3rd or 4th grow because there are more important things to learn first. I myself remove ALL BRANCHES on the bottom 1/3 of the plant in late veg/early flower gradually. This allows more energy to be concentrated on the upper sites where the big buds roam. I also lollipop my plants which is removing young bud sites from the lower part of the branches to promote more growth up higher, again, where the big bids roam.

Some people also just cut the non-green leaf areas from each fan leaf, others pull fans off, some cut or pinch them. It's all opinion of what works best and why. If you are a novice let the plant decide when to remove the leaves and concentrate on other things.

Thank you thank you thank all very helpful

I didn't think you needed the leaves to grow bud. I thought the bud simply grew off the stem like a twinkie.... lol jk

racerboy71 said:

the buds don't need the light, it's the leaves that make the food and sugars that grow buds..

build a happy canopy of healthy leaves and you will have a happy plant that grows nice buds..
yes, it's true that buds at the lower part of a plant don't receive as much light as the ones at the top of a plant due to the nature of light, which fades very fast over distances.. so by removing any healthy leaves from the top of a plant which are receiving the most light, therefore doing the most work for the plant, only to try and get more light to the lower sections of a plant, you're really shooting yourself in the foot so to speak..
don't remove any leaves during the grows, and in fact, simply concentrate all of your efforts on keeping all of the leaves that you have nice and healthy throughout the grow, you're plants will be their healthiest, and therefore yield the best they can..

leaves are the power houses of plants.. they take in light and convert it to food and sugars via photosynthesis.. leaves grow buds, not the other way around..

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You kinda shot your self in the foot by saying buds don't need light cause if that was the case then lower bud sites would grow or side buds would grow like top main bud which in comparison Never do

Yodadawanker said:

You kinda shot your self in the foot by saying buds don't need light cause if that was the case then lower bud sites would grow or side buds would grow like top main bud which in comparison Never do

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Your kinda making a good point, hmm...

jayjayeee said:

So my buddy says that you need to pick off the leaves on the plants every so often, his reasoning is (1) that it helps to push more of the energy into the buds instead of the leaves and (2) because the lower leaves aren't receiving full sunlight and are a waste of the plants energy.
I can understand picking off dying leaves but isn't this just causing the plant to put more energy into regrowing the leaves? I've also heard that you want a lot of sunlight to get to the buds so is that a reason to pick off the leaves?
Thanks Thanks Thanks

Click to expand...

I personally only pick off leaves if they are about 50% compromised. Think of the leaves as panels for light. That is the area where photsynthesis occurs. If you are removing those panels in hopes of making a thinner canopy so that light may penetrate down to your lower area, not the greatest idea but some do it and will continue to do it others do not like myself.

Yodadawanker said:

You kinda shot your self in the foot by saying buds don't need light cause if that was the case then lower bud sites would grow or side buds would grow like top main bud which in comparison Never do

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Not at all.. lower budding sites and branches stretch up to try to break the canopy but rarely if ever receive enough light to produce any product above a c- grade of product. The buds are airy and premature on strains that bush out and have multiple top colas. Why is this? Because the solar panels, ie; Leaves, can't get enough light.
Thats why the knowledgeable grower will cut away the lower 1/3 of their plants upon switching the light cycle. This negates the bottom branches that would've produced shitty buds and used up alot of the plants energies. Now those energies can be used by the top of the plant to make more bud and leaves.

General rule of thumb is those leaves are solar panels. they catch the sun, convert it to energy and feed the plant. When a leaf becomes 40% necrotic, it begins to hinder the plant by wasteing these energies on itself just to keep alive, this is why you take the leaf.

For large SCROG or SOG grows or rooms overcrowded with larger plants, you can cut the top leaves horizontally across the blades up to half way without stressing the plant or hindering its ability to produce food for the plant. This will also create more open space for the secondary or Midgrade flowers to get bigger by receiving more light to their leaves.

Lastly, Cannabis flowers at night. It spends the day tracking the suns arc with its fan leaves and storing energy and heat for night time deployment. This why Cannabis glows on an infrared camera if it is grown in a field.

Yodadawanker said:

You kinda shot your self in the foot by saying buds don't need light cause if that was the case then lower bud sites would grow or side buds would grow like top main bud which in comparison Never do

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if that were true, go ahead and cut off all of the leaves on your plants, and see just how big the buds would get on their own..
go ahead, i'll give you a dollar..

jayjayeee said:

So my buddy says that you need to pick off the leaves on the plants every so often, his reasoning is (1) that it helps to push more of the energy into the buds instead of the leaves and (2) because the lower leaves aren't receiving full sunlight and are a waste of the plants energy.
I can understand picking off dying leaves but isn't this just causing the plant to put more energy into regrowing the leaves? I've also heard that you want a lot of sunlight to get to the buds so is that a reason to pick off the leaves?
Thanks Thanks Thanks

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How much growing experience does your buddy have?

racerboy71 said:

if that were true, go ahead and cut off all of the leaves on your plants, and see just how big the buds would get on their own..
go ahead, i'll give you a dollar..

Click to expand...

i have many times its called a SCROG other techniques loli poping read your post what you are saying is buds don't need light so in other words you are totally wrong BUDS do need light that is what makes a difference of a CFL grow and a 1000 watt grow as per yield LIGHT you ever notice how the top bud dwarfs all others ??? cause its the closest to the light
pruning Techniques are used in many styles of growing
now i don't agree on randomly picking healthy leafs off any plant as you are correct its the fuel for the main engine on a plant but in your post you make it sound like buds don't need light and my reply is if that is the case then lower buds would be the size of main bud and they never are

the best advice i have for new guys is to learn to trust your own logic
if someone tells you something completely ridiculous....
look - if a mother fucker tells you - oh, yeah - if you want perfect nugs, do this stupid fucking shit that noone would ever logic themselves to do cause it's counterintuitive to what you know to be true or even just fucking downright stupid....

from the instant you plant a single seed
when someone says, do this or that thing to your plant that is different from what is logical to you
you say - is that what you do to your plants?
then you say - that's what i thought OR lemme see
don't change your working grow for a mystery grow by an idiot asshole

by the way - if you sew your ol ladys mouth shut, she'll stop nagging AND stay skinny
that's what i did - sewed her mouth shut
also - rubbing alcohol added to your oil in your car keeps the cylinders clean
also, if you grease your headlight bearings, they run brighter
also - changing the oil for engine health is a myth started by the mechanics(idiots) - you don't need to do that

gl - hf = use your head for thinking
use your friends head for a 1 gallon pot

Your buddy should not be your source of information.

bud sites receive energy and materials according to plant need which is communicated through hormones
my g133 haze makes harder bigger nugs in it's base crotch than my wonder haze does at it's apex
my g13 haze is so dense a canopy that there is no VISIBLE penetration of INTENSE VISIBLE light more than literally 5-6 inches into the plant
my wonder haze is long and lanky with virtually no fan leaves naturally, allowing for TERRIFFIC penetraition
at the end of the day, they're still gonna give me about zip n a half per gallon of root ball, if i listen to THEM and ignore the irrational fucktards

well there are diff leaves that serve the plant on differnt levels

first let me say -i have tried removing them in diff stages
my findigs are the long stem large fan leaves are needed to grow the plant only
and supply energy they are soler panels for stems and veging
to me there need is mostly finished after first 1/3 of flower (stretch)
i sumtimes remove here
an i sumtime remove around second third of flower
sum plants they start to die off in the second third of flower

now the leaves stickin out of buds never touch
small fans right below sum genetics cover them in trichs - never touch
the never touh means they stay till chop down no matter whut
to remove them is to hurt yourself hurt yo production bad

removing long stemed fans especially at nodes only effect the branch or stem it grows from
i have left them all and revoed the removables at fiff stages

and i suggest all to experiment for self dont take nobodys word for shit
see for self and keep in mind we all grow diff seeds wit diff setups wit diff lights for diff purposes sum look for size
sum gotta pay ther rent wit it sum dont care how bad the yield is just got be da best dam shit
sum corner hustlers sum grow for patients sum conisours sum just want to brag an take pics sum wnt to put you down
all diff but all got sumtin to say sum dont know shit an should be listnin -but they speaken to
10 diff imputs think about it if all are diff only one can be right

so i say all this to say do you -do whuts best for you your seeds there needs your setup your lights your nutes

best of luck read collect data
once you growin for self by self no longer needing some one to hold your hand or training wheels
then you are free
knowledg will free you read
read

oh did i say you have got to

READ



gluck





I an I