Defoleate confusion

[PuravidaC]

I am totally wacked about defoliating, so here goes. Please be kind... "there is no such thing as a stupid question, only stupid people asking questions"! After trying my hand at defoliating last grow and reading Sirius's tutorial in this week's newsletter, I am just as confused as ever. A couple of questions:
#1- what is the difference between fan leaves and sugar leaves? I know sugar leaves grow out of buds but are they just "late" fan leaves and can they be trimmed to open bud sites?
#2- My first grow stretched like crazy, second grow not at all. I didn't know what I was looking at on first grow so during strech don't stretching colas produced more bud sites during early flower?
#3- With topping and LST my plants get short and compact. In order to "open up budsites" I have to trim new fan leaves near the top of colas, not buds. Is this okay?
#4- I know leaves are the engine that drives plant growth. Will any leaves do the job or should large fan leaves on sides of plant that aren't blocking light to any buds be left to help plant continue to grow.

Okay people... open season!!! 😂

[PuravidaC]

Damn... can't even spell defoliate correctly. See what I mean about being confused???

[007]

Spell it however, we all knew what you meant! I leave sugar leaves alone myself. Fan leaves can go, however. I pull anything down low that isn't going to make it into the canopy to start with. Next, I pull any overlapping fan leaves, because if one is already there soaking up the light the other isn't doing much and it's just taking up growing resources. I find that the older the fan leaf, the sooner it will show damage or get funky so I never end up with many "old" fan leaves. I also pull any that become overly damaged, maybe from over feeding. If it looks unhealthy, it goes away. And lastly, I try to remove any blocking bud sites. If I can pull a fan leaf and get light directly down to some lower buds, it goes away. Just how I do it anyways

[PuravidaC]

Photos of plant after trimming this morning so you can get a better idea what I have and suggestions on what should go...

[South Sierra Dude]

I've adopted Dr. Green's method: "most leaves don't mange it past two weeks. My goal is to keep the plant as squat as possible with close growing nodes".

[PuravidaC]

My plant is short and nodes are close together. I just don't have the experience (or balls) that you and Dr. Green have... but I do like big buds!!!

[GreenArmadillo]

Mate, all i'ma say is your girl looks SUPER HEALTHY. I can sense the loving care fam. =)

Also, i'm on my first grow now and totally just learning about defoliating. At first I was a bit hesitant and barely touched the leaves, but as my girls grow older I grow bolder. So now I literally just take off any leaves I see that I "feel" don't need to be there. The girls don't seem to mind, so i'm sure there's no damage being done.
As a final thought, now that i've seen the general pattern of growth, I think defoliating is something that should definitely be done. It keeps things under control.

[yamiacaveman]

Hi PuravidaC -- I'm on my first grow and nearing the end --- defoliate!!!! Don't be scared, lol.

Listen, I was not going to do anything to my first grow. as a matter of fact went with auto's and kind soil to make it as easy as possible, all I wanted to do for my first grow was to get to the end and have some bud in hand (any amount) or leaves in hand, just something to smoke. As long as I didn't kill them in the process I was happy. Now toward the end I wish I had trained them too.

Your girls look real healthy -- as did mine when I start d to defoliate. Nothing happened to them and they continue to flourish.

When I first started, I just started to take off the big fan leaves and followed the general rule of not taking more than a 1/3 off at one time. So I would snip one day, wait a couple of days, all seemed good, snipped some more, now I take a few leaves off my one plant every day, not many but when I see a leaf getting bigger and blocking some light -- snip snip.

Again, so far, they don't seem to mind the trimming. I have nothing to compare my first grow too. but it does seem to make a lot of sense to give those buds the light that they need.

Bottom line, no matter what you decide, enjoy your grow.