To prune or not to prune, what's the real deal. . . .

[greenhead]

Yeah, there's been a million topics about this, but there does not seem to be a general consensus. Some people believe in pruning heavily, some light, and some not at all.

Has anybody ever grown 2 identical clones and heavily pruned one, while leaving the other alone ?

What I'm trying to find out is does pruning give you a better yield ? Does snipping away the bottom growth really re-direct the energy towards the top buds ? I read that roots are connected to specific branches, so why would the energy be re-directed someplace else ?

Many of the arguments for pruning has to do with having better airflow under the canopy, especially if you're doing a scrog or LST etc. But is that the main benefit to pruning ? What if you don't have airflow problems, or don't have to worry about any rot or mildew etc ?

I'm just on my third grow, but I haven't decided yet if it's a good idea to remove the bottom popcorn buds and extra foliage on the bottom yet. If removing them will not increase the bud size on the top of the canopy, then I'm not going to bother to remove them. After reading about pruning for a while, I have found no clear answers, just wildly varying opinions.

Next time I grow, I'll just probably do an experiment and find out for myself. I'm going to heavily prune one plant and leave the other one completely alone, and I'll make up my own mind.

 

[libby]

If you had a flowering plant, any one,and say it had 6 flowering stalks, and they grew as nature intended, lets say they grew to an ounce each, or an inch big.

cut three buds off, as they start to show, then the other three will double there size and weight.

cut two off and the others will share the spoils

Cut five off then you have one big cola/

This is how flower growers all over the world grow plants to become single specimens,

Sure you understand, simple really.

 

[Smoking Gun]

I have never grown two clones next to each other with this experiment, but I have done it with two plants from the same seed stock. the plant that I trimmed the bottom branches had bigger top colas and they were covered in more trichomes. I would have to say the yield improved as well, because the untrimmed one, although being in a container that was about 3 times the size as the trimmed one, yielded less.

But I would still try doing the experiment yourself. There are three reasons; first I might have imperfect results from my experiment. Secondly, maybe different plants react differently to trimming. And third, its just a fun experiment to do. So go try it out, and report back to us on YOUR findings.

 

[hoodini]

I definetly think trimming the lower branches is the way to go. I just harvested my crop of AK-47 and the ones I didnt trim had smaller popcorn buds that wernt fully developed. It seemed like I had to manicure 5 times more that the one that the lower branches/bigger cola's and much better looking erb. Cant tell you for sure if I yielded more with the lower branches trimmed because I grew from seed.

 

[Guest]

Its going to depend a whole lot on strain.I saw bigger colas and better yield pruning a columnar indica like blockhead,not so much on more sativa plants like grapefruit.

 

[Binnacas]

I'm on my second grow and so I don't have much experience but it seems logical that if in fact the roots are connected to specific branches then the issue is indeed in the roots. Puring lower buds would allow the plant to focus it's energy to other buds I think but if you have enough space for roots, let's say in an outdoor grow with a lot of good soil or in a hydro then I don't think there's a need for pruning, provided there's enough light and air circulation.

When there's enough rootmass (with all the nutes they want) then light becomes the weaker link, which we must then make better. In outdoor grows this shouldn't really be a problem. Indoors, using one of various training methods gives you the opportunity to give all the budsites enough light. I see no reason to start pruning the lower buds when you can make em all yield considerably more, by giving them all that they need.

It's hard to answer the question because it always depends on the situation, but I think it's true that cutting the lower buds gives the plant more energy to focus to the others. Dunno then if it's a good thing to do. But cutting leaves out is a bad thing I think. They're the plants sun panels and when they're still green and healthy there's only harm to be done to the plant if they were cut away, because that reduces the plants efficiency to absorb the light.

Dunno if I answered anything with this but just wanted to throw in my opinion. I would like to see an actual testing grow of this matter, just out of curiosity. It's hard to think that there hasn't been one already. Anyways, good luck on both pruned and not pruned grows

 

[hoodini]

I was reading a thread on another site with a very experienced hydro grower would chop the hell out of his girls. I believe in doing so he was pulling 3 lbs per 1k HPS. He was even doing away with lower fan leaves and all. Wish I still had the thread saved but fried my hardrive and lost alot of info.

 

[Binnacas]

I really don't know how much you can get with a 1k but I think it's way more that 3 lbs. Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[greenhead]

I really don't know how much you can get with a 1k but I think it's way more that 3 lbs. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Pulling 1 gram per watt is pretty damn good, and I don't believe that the majority of growers are achieving that ratio, regardless of their light.

1 lb is 453 grams, so 3 lbs would be 1361 grams, and that sounds pretty damn good for a 1000 watt light. I don't know much about 1000 watt lights, I only use a 150 myself, but I don't think that too many growers are pulling more than 3 lbs off of one single 1000 watt light, and certainly not way more than 3 lbs.

 

[Binnacas]

Oh damn, I'm sorry I didn't remember lb is that much! I'm more comfortable with the metric system

Anyways in that case I have to say: Wow! Holy ****!