Pruning Flowers to Increase Yield?

After pruning all the small flowering side branches off of 3 of my 8 plants to increase yield, I came home the next day to find most of the lower leaves rapidly turning yellow. I know this is natural and is caused by the usage of blah-blah in the leaves for the flowers, but a light went off in my head.

By trimming off those side branches I took off a lot of leaves along with it, so I was wondering what if you just trimmed the flowers off, and left the side branches full of leaves. It was obvious that the plant was demanding a lot of energy from the leaves, and by cutting them off, it caused more strain on the leaves that were left. And this way all the sugars from the leaves that would normally be cut off would go to the main cola, instead of the trashcan.

Anyone heard of or done this? I have 5 other unpruned plants and I am going to set up an experiment to test it, but would like some input first.

Yes, it is well known by most growers, that removal of the lower branches will put growth into the main cola. It's best to anticipate the stretching they will do in flower, and remove a lot of the lower branches during veg'.

Nobody likes popcorn.

I never removed any lower branches, but I also had light that was penetrating the lower portion of the plant. I did very little prunning also. (Did cut 5 clones) Into flowering, and as some of the leaves have finally started to turn yellow I have now started to remove only leaves. I now have 35 main leads coming off of the main trunk covered in buds from top to bottom. Harvest is soon.

I took the bottom branches off on my Northern lights and the colas are friggin huge there pics in my norethern lights thread on this page...

I've started flowering four weeks ago and my lower branches seem like there dying should i cut the bottom branches off even though im flowering

How long did you veg that plant for?

upabove said:

I never removed any lower branches, but I also had light that was penetrating the lower portion of the plant. I did very little prunning also. (Did cut 5 clones) Into flowering, and as some of the leaves have finally started to turn yellow I have now started to remove only leaves. I now have 35 main leads coming off of the main trunk covered in buds from top to bottom. Harvest is soon.

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wunshot said:

How long did you veg that plant for?

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i got them the cannabis club i brought them on the jan 17 and veg up till the 22 they where 31 and 34 inches tall before i started flowering the top branches are dark green with no leafs dead but only the bottom i had but a heater in my grow room for not even a minute and I had it too close to my plant and it made some of my leafs curl on the bottom then i cut those leafs of and every since then i had this problem not to mention one day i gave the wrong fert which was veg instead of bloom fert and then i flushed out the veg and then put the bloom so i dont what the problem is can you please help me also it seems like the bottom buds are getting rippen quickly then the top i wonder the top is still making new buds and still open at the top cola