Defoliation: Hi-Yield Technique?

[daheadies]

should i defol or not in 59 day of flower??
i have many fan leaves and prechaps is good idea..
someone suggest me that but im not sure..any thoughts??

At this point you would only be defoliating to make plants use up all their stored nutrients (the plant does this naturally at end of flower/ when leaves die off/ yellow out naturally when flushing) Dont defoliate at day 59 and expect much bigger nugs or any of the other benefits given by defoliation..

 

[fido]

experience is science.

what he^^^^^said
fido

 

[bs0]

should i defol or not in 59 day of flower??
i have many fan leaves and prechaps is good idea..
someone suggest me that but im not sure..any thoughts??

It can't hurt at this point, I think you might get a little better coloring up of your lower buds and possibly slight plumping of them. Nothing significant as far as yield, but might see a little quality improvement on the lower stuff.

 

[huntingbb]

when i started week 6 of 12/12 and i defol'd about half the girls, ill have some pix up in a while...

 

[Smoking Nomad]

Another reason defoliating works is that the plant does not spend energy pushing out leaves and more energy is directed toward the flower.....just sayin

 

[CLOWD11]

Ive just done a SC99 side by side. About half way through flower i thought id give it whirl with one specimen. A week or 2 later the remaining leaves and growth were a lot greener and the buds did end up bigger but just slightly. I dont think my timing was very good, but my plant didnt fall over and suffer a horrible death that some here portray and the plant didnt suffer yeild loss.
It seems to be those opposed to this technique who whinge the loudest in this thread.

 

[Dicomaco]

Everything in moderation.

I have not witnessed a difference in flower, other than reduced mold due to more airflow in otherwise crowded areas in my scrog.

BUT, in vegetative phase it's a big help to remove 1-2 huge fan leaves now and then in order to let light shine on the lower branches that would otherwise be in the shadow. At least when only using 250w, it helps a lot if you want more than 2 feet fully developed plants.

Just my experience.

 

[Core]

i just call it pinching.....i do it tru there intire cycle, doing it for a few years now....there is only a very small advantage...you make more light for lower buds thus giving them the chance to grow a bit....notthing more...and i have seen no ill affect on plants ...if you do it graduatly...

 

[budlover123]

2750+ posts in this thread, there is certainly something to this defoliation

I say before you spend hours tying shit down, give this a shot. do it late in veg if at all and in early flower, and take any big fan leaves that are blocking a lot of light until the whole plant looks like it's getting some direct light. once or twice in the first 4 weeks

 

[ijim]

Has anyone tried the defoliation technique using T5 fluorescent light? I had a veg rack 30" deep by 48" wide stacked three high with about 32' clearance used to veg for outdoors. Each rack had a 48" 8 tube T5 with 48 6"X6" pots per rack. I am thinking that if I use the rack for flowering as soon as roots develop with the defol method I could get a sufficient yield using a lot less energy and space. The T5 should get decent penetration. I may not get the yield with half the number of plants and 1000 watts. But my stash would be a hell of a lot cheaper. And safer with my new digital electric meter. Any input would be appreciated.

 

[outinit]

going to give it a try!!!!

 

[Smoking Nomad]

just finished a diffinative test on my subjects. My conclusion was that defoliation when done only to lightened and yellowing leaf results in the heaviest total yield. If I remove the lower stems, the upper is not affected at all or at the very least minimumally....just sayin......HAVE FUN!!!!!

 

[BillChillson]

I have been testing this out with my current crop, along with scrog training and I gotta say I definitely see alot more budding. These plants are so vigourous I dont see much of anything slowing them down.

 

[Herborizer]

I did two rounds. One with defoliation and one with not. Everything elese the same. I saw 30% more yield with defoliating. Also, the defoliated harvest had very little popcorn bud.

 

[ErnestHemingway]

So I have an idea to run by everyone. I was reading on this thread, specifically this post:


and it got me to thinking about how it could be applied to the defoliation technique. I think spraying with Jasmonic acid just prior to a serious prune job would help it recover faster, then spray with chitosan shortly after the prune job. I think probably a day either way, just to give the plant a chance to gear up it's defense mechanisms with the JA, then to boost growth after it has a day to recover with the chitosan. If this is off base bringing it into this thread, I apologize. I thought it might be an interesting experiment to run with defoliation. I would do it myself right now, but I just finished my first grow with limited success (hydro using tap water in a tight closet). I will be growing again this summer and plan on trying my experiment, barring anyone trying it and finding detrimental results.

After reading about the results with defoliation, and reading up on plant hormones and spraying with these compounds, I think the yield could be pretty awesome, with as good or better quality buds.

Cheers all!

Jasmonic acid seems like it would be good against herbivory and to help plants recover from topping and pruning.

The only problem I've come across is that I have searched high and low and cannot find a way to get/purchase this stuff. My search results only in scientific information about the plant jasmine and the uses and benefits from the jasmonic acid.

Does anyone know where you can get this stuff? Besides finding or growing jasmine and harvesting and extracting it yourself. I've read that it is brewed into a tea and consumed in China.

The jasmine flower is actually quite interesting. The flower only blooms and opens during the night with the light of the moon. It is harvested in early morning sunrise when the flower closes back up into a little ball. Maybe it's useless information but I thought that was pretty cool.

Sorry if I brought up a dead topic but this post caught my eye and I would like to experiment with it and see if it really does have practical uses. From what I've read it can kill/deter bugs and mites when they eat your plant when it has been applied with the jasmonic acid. This seems almost too good to be true! To be able to make a spray that helps your plant recover from pruning/topping and takes care of any infestations and bug issues you have. I don't know about anyone else but this sounds like something that I'd be interested in.

Has anyone used it and know where to get it? Help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks a bunch!

-Ernest

 

[FRIENDinDEED]

this thread was started in 5/2010 and here it is still going strong in 8/2011!!! been defoliating my plants since the thread was started and havent looked back! hopefully many more will get it and keep doing it. its worked on every one of my grows so its full proof.

get those fan leaves off of there!! and let the budsites rock out!

 

[med4u]

i scrog,therefore i defoliate,even thou i have not read this entire thread,i have read many many others on this very subject,my take on it is,the leaves are for feeding the root system,the root system is for feeding the plant,once a healthy root system has been established,the need for an over abundance of leaves becomes less important as we induce the flowering process the energy is focused more on the bud sites,the plant too wants to produce large sticky buds to collect as much pollen as possible,with the leaves and lower growth gone the energy(auxins and nutrients) are transfered directly to the bud sites,i know this is a rudementry description of the process,obviously it is abundently more complex,however in practical applications it holds true, in my experience,limited as it may be,i have managed 7lbs of 8 to 10 inch fat buds from 9 plants in a 3x4 scrog,it works hope yours does too well second post out of the way,figured id bury it back here

 

[Justinsane]

12/12 Mango Haze

12/12 Mango Haze

Hi guys!

I just started my 2nd grow when i found this great thread.

I have 7 mango haze under a 600w lamp, going directly in to 12/12, today is day 7.

Is this Technique recommended when going directly in to 12/12 with no veg time? If so, when and how much?

Read a lot in this thread but dident find so much info on 12/12.

I like this idea, but am i little scared as well

First ever post aswell.

Cheers JustInSane

 

[smokefrogg]

^^^ in 12/12 wait till the budsites are at least an inch or so big, then you can take off it's accompanying fan leaf

it is good to not go willy nilly taking them all of, but if they are blocking budsites or potential good budsites then it would be best to remove the fan leaves blocking these in 12/12

just don't go too hard mode with it imho, it can screw your yield up if you go nuts plucking the crap out of the poor plant

 

[smilley]

I admit I didn't read the entire thread, but I did read the pdf compilation and paged through some of the thread. Kudos to all the knowledgeable growers contributing to this thread and I've learned a tremendous amount of info in a very short amount of time. Very interesting!!!