To defoliate or not?

[Chi13]

A basic science experiment would involve clones grown under identical conditions. One group would be left undefoliated, other groups would be defoliated. At the end the buds would be weighed. Simple really. Anyone who simply takes the leaves off a plant and says that it works does not understand this basic science, as they have not compared the two. No one is arguing that you can't grow good defoliated plants. You can. The only argument is whether they have increased yield compared to plants that have the leaves left on.

Anyone who wants examples of good grows of undefoliated plants can look at Hammers work for starters, but there are plenty of others. If they want examples of sativas, star crash has an excellent thread about Nevil's x c5/mango. He also has a monster indoor O'haze I think. Kangativa's thread is another one, There are plenty of good grows where leaves are left on. As I said though, just showing a good grow proves nothing, unless you are comparing 2 identical clones under the same conditions. The post earlier I quoted #52 from Glen Johnson outlines what an experiment is about.

 

[@hempy]

A basic science experiment would involve clones grown under identical conditions. One group would be left undefoliated, other groups would be defoliated. At the end the buds would be weighed. Simple really. Anyone who simply takes the leaves off a plant and says that it works does not understand this basic science, as they have not compared the two. No one is arguing that you can't grow good defoliated plants. You can. The only argument is whether they have increased yield compared to plants that have the leaves left on.

Anyone who wants examples of good grows of undefoliated plants can look at Hammers work for starters, but there are plenty of others. If they want examples of sativas, star crash has an excellent thread about Nevil's x c5/mango. He also has a monster indoor O'haze I think. Kangativa's thread is another one, There are plenty of good grows where leaves are left on. As I said though, just showing a good grow proves nothing, unless you are comparing 2 identical clones under the same conditions. The post earlier I quoted #52 from Glen Johnson outlines what an experiment is about.

Any topic that comes up and any disagrees with you, you take it as an attack. All I said was none can change your mind and your response is I'm butt hurt. In what reality does that make sense. As all can see its more than a few that think what you do is not the best method to grow cannabis. As you know I don't care how you grow. When others don't accept your nonsense you turn 10. Why do you care so much when any disagrees. Move on. Stop worrying about who is and isn't agreeing with you. You like to strip your plants of their leaves so do that .

Quoted and saved as i know you will edit them you 2 need therapy.

 

[Hammerhead]

Sure sure.. Why would I edit that? It's 200% spot on. At my age therapy wouldn't help lol. I def have doubts you are as old as you claim to be. Your tantrums are getting old. If you have nothing else to add to this discussion move on.

 

[@hempy]

Sure sure.. Why would I edit that? It's 200% spot on. At my age therapy wouldn't help lol. I def have doubts you are as old as you claim to be. Your tantrums are getting old. If you have nothing else to add to this discussion move on.

Hammer and Chi13 are clearly here to provoke an argument from me then blame me for it.

I know how you work your far from smart you post and insult people and then come back and edit and blame others.

No more responses from me i will leave this to Cosmic.

 

[Hammerhead]

 

[Chi13]

Hammer and Chi13 are clearly here to provoke an argument from me then blame me for it.

I know how you work your far from smart you post and insult people and then come back and edit and blame others.

No more responses from me i will leave this to Cosmic.

Hopefully Cosmic will appreciate the irony, although I am sure he/she has better things to do.

 

[Donald Mallard]

No one will change Hempys mind.

what i find ironic is in one post he says its ok to do what ever works for you ,
but then someone tries to ask for some of the scientific proof he claims backs him and he goes off the deep end accusing them of harassing him etc ,
either its ok for differing methods , or its not , you cant have it both ways ....

personally i dont defoliate , i do some pruning ,
i doubt fully defoliating cannabis is good for the plant at the end of the day,
i have seen no evidence to suggest yields are increased at all ,
the buds are not of greater mass , they look similar if not less ,

admitadly i dont grow indoors ,
but im still sure i wouldnt waste my time pulling every single leaf off ,
darn things are there for a good reason ,
so let em be i say , allow them to do the job they are made to do ,

if you wanna rip them all off , go for your life too,
but dont try to convince others its better and science backs you ,
because no where does it do that ,, not one single bit of scientific evidence says defoliating cannabis is better,
its more like a choice , probably done by guys that chew their nails or something ... lol ...

 

[BadTicket]

Hammer and Chi13 are clearly here to provoke an argument from me then blame me for it.

I know how you work your far from smart you post and insult people and then come back and edit and blame others.

No more responses from me i will leave this to Cosmic.

 

[Switcher56]

I believe the word itself "defoliating" can be misleading. Watch!

Day 8 flower, ringo's gift

Day 17 flower

 

[Hammerhead]

what i find ironic is in one post he says its ok to do what ever works for you ,
but then someone tries to ask for some of the scientific proof he claims backs him and he goes off the deep end accusing them of harassing him etc ,
either its ok for differing methods , or its not , you cant have it both ways ....

personally i dont defoliate , i do some pruning ,
i doubt fully defoliating cannabis is good for the plant at the end of the day,
i have seen no evidence to suggest yields are increased at all ,
the buds are not of greater mass , they look similar if not less ,

admitadly i dont grow indoors ,
but im still sure i wouldnt waste my time pulling every single leaf off ,
darn things are there for a good reason ,
so let em be i say , allow them to do the job they are made to do ,

if you wanna rip them all off , go for your life too,
but dont try to convince others its better and science backs you ,
because no where does it do that ,, not one single bit of scientific evidence says defoliating cannabis is better,
its more like a choice , probably done by guys that chew their nails or something ... lol ...

I do the same. I agree.

 

[@hempy]

Two types of people in this world thinkers and sheep.

Insulting people only makes you look stupid and petty when you disagree on a topic .


Conclusion

With this research, it has been shown that crop production can be increased by physiological stimulation of plants. In greenhouse researches, it has been determined that reduction in the photosynthetic surface, through a certain number of defoliations in the plant, results in an increase in photosynthetic activity in the remaining leaves of the plant, which causes significant increases in the agricultural characteristics.

Using the method developed in this research, decreasing the number of leaves at the beginning of the reproductive stage in sunflower plant has resulted in significant increase in agricultural characteristics such as seed yield, crude protein yield, and crude oil yield. Thanks to this developed environmentally friendly production method, an increase of about 120,000 tons of crude oil production has been achieved in sunflower. The developed method can be successfully used in other plants to increase the crop production.
https://www.intechopen.com/chapters/57302


You can watch a full grow in time lapse that used Defoliation.

5K Cannabis Time-lapse - threealight.com



Good video but age restricted.

 

[Chi13]

Great video but it is not an experiment. You can grow great defoliated cannabis, but unless you compare a group of defoliated cannabis to the same clones of undefoliated cannabis, then nothing is proved.

So, sunflowers are not cannabis. Neither is cotton. Defoliation does work on some crops. It does not on others. Here's a few more studies. Wish someone would actually do one on cannabis.

PAPAYA
75% defoliation reduced new fruit set by 60%, compared to the controls during the 6 weeks after defoliation. Continual defoliation reduced new fruit to less than one-third of controls in the first 8 weeks of defoliation and less than one-fourth of the controls in the 168 day experimental period. Continual defoliation significantly reduced ripe fruit Total Soluble Solids (-15%) and fruit weight (-23%). Flower abortion increased nine fold and new fruit set was reduced 30% in plants subjected to 75% defoliation from the oldest to youngest leaves.

______________________________ ______________________________ __________
KIWI
Removing 50% of the leaves resulted in a small, but significant, reduction in fruit weight compared to the control vines. More severe defoliation (75%) reduced fruit weight by 13 g in the RCZ (replacement cane zone) and 7 g in the FZ (fruiting zone). The defoliation treatment reduced the concentrations of starch and total soluble carbohydrates in the shoots and starch in trunk bark compared to those in control vines. The treatments caused a large reduction in return bloom, expressed as number of flowers per winter bud, by about 25% and 53% in vines with 50% and 75% defoliation, respectively.

______________________________ ______________________________ ____________
STRAWBERRIES
Plants were grown in a greenhouse in Tunja, Colombia, in hydroponics with an aerated nutrient solution. As leaves emerged, one or two leaflets were removed from each compound leaf, to attain 38 % and 67 % reduction of leaf area. Control plants grew intact, without defoliation. Fruit yield and fruit quality characteristics were evaluated for each plant. The pH, total soluble solids, ratio of total soluble solids to fruit juice acidity, fruit yield, fruit mass and size, and the ratio of leaf area/fruit yield were reduced drastically in defoliated plants. Leaf area reduction in excess of 38 % adversely affected physical and chemical characteristics of strawberry fruit, which did not meet marketing criteria.

______________________________ ______________________________ _____________
TOMATOES
Artificial defoliation of tomato plants by removing more than half of each leaflet, detachment of whole leaves from the lower three-quarters of the plant or of two leaves between each truss, caused up to 40% yield loss.

https://cannabis-science-consulting.com/cannabis-defoliation-studies/

 

[Donald Mallard]

i wish that too chi,
i can see how plants placed so close like in that video ,
and one of the examples maryjane showed ,
that unless they pull some leaf of there is going to be some pm issues ,
well if the conditions were right and the airflow was not ideal ,

they are both not really natural conditions ,
]and i agree in some conditions and with some modern hybrids ,
a bit of pruning can be beneficial ,
when i hear the term defoliate ,
i assume it means take off the leaf , all of it ,
not just a little pruning like many of us do .. ..

hempy , who was it insulting you ,\
can you quote the post where you are insulted ,
i scrolled this page and didnt see anything insulting said to you , \
maybe im missing it ,, can you show me where ??

 

[Switcher56]

Great video but it is not an experiment. You can grow great defoliated cannabis, but unless you compare a group of defoliated cannabis to the same clones of undefoliated cannabis, then nothing is proved.

Then make it so! ... and report back in 3 grows.

"proven" BTW

 

[Hammerhead]

IMO Cannabis plants cant grow well without their leaves for photosynthesis. Can it grow without them obviously it can but would need to reallocate its energies to grow more leaves. We see this in every picture posted that used aggressive defoliation..

 

[VerdantGreen]

This is a controversial topic, and what makes it even more controversial is that everyone in the thread seems to have their own definition of defoliation - to some it means removing the odd leaf that is fading or old or in the way... and to others it means stripping nearly all the healthy leaves off a plant! - a lot of the discussion/disagreement thus far has been at cross purposes !

 

[Donald Mallard]

Yes seems to be the case verdant green ,
and the exact definition of a word or term often causes similar problems ,
this is something regularly debated in courts too ,
the exact meaning of some terminology or wording,

anyhow i found a few dictionary definitions ,
generally its agreed in most of them that defoliate means widespread loss of leaves ,
all the way to totally stripping leaf from a plant/tree ,
i think we can eliminate defoliation being just removing the odd leaf ,
its a lot more than that judging by what ive read ...

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/defoliation


to destroy or cause widespread loss of leaves in (an area of jungle, forest, etc.), as by using chemical sprays or incendiary bombs, in order to deprive enemy troops or guerrilla forces of concealment. verb (used without object), de·fo·li·at·ed, de·fo·li·at·ing. to lose leaves.

Bonsai defoliation (or leaf cutting) is a technique of bonsai styling in which all or a large part of the leaves and all buds at the end of each shoot of a bonsai tree are removed with a sharp bonsai scissors.

 

[Switcher56]

Bonsai defoliation (or leaf cutting) is a technique of bonsai styling in which all or a large part of the leaves and all buds at the end of each shoot of a bonsai tree are removed with a sharp bonsai scissors.

... called training and, not all Bonsais are comprised of "leaves"

 

[bsgospel]

I need a refresher on nutrient sinks in older leaves. (I'm in the non-defol. camp.) The only reason I take leaves off is dying/yellowing, or to prevent some moisture from overlap. I've heard it suggested though, that at a certain stage of development, older leaves just become a sink and nutrition goes in but doesn't really come out. Is there any reason to think that a removal of older leaves to alleviate that possibility is worth anything?

 

[f-e]

I just trimmed up this branch
I pulled the fans that shaded the small shoots at the nodes. Non of the others are holding back competitive branches, so they can stay. The shoots are a fairly high density. On the arm to the right of the pic, I have pulled every second shoot. Also taking a couple of shade leafs off on the side, to allow a competitor to get it's head up into the action. Ideally I would like to see one good sized bud, every 80-100mm across the net. Leaving in more shoots will only lead to a higher density. So they will all be smaller and airflow reduced. Giving more of a white canopy effect, than larger buds stood in their own space.
Really have to be confident at this point. See what you have, and what you could have. Don't try for too much. Position what's good, and loose the rest.

It has potential to be one large head, with enough air around it to not rot something that dense. Uncovering them shoots, should stop them shooting... but the shape of things two weeks from now will be quite different.

Edit: Yes.. it was pot bound and not getting the P or Ca it wanted.