i was reading about “schwazzing” the other day, i had never heard of it before. its an extreme pruning method where you remove ALL fan leaves at day 1 and day 21 of flowering. seems like it would be harmful but people report great results. anyone tried it?
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I like to beat them with a stick while saying “bad plant bad plant.”
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Depends on the plants individual growth habits. Sometimes top them, sometimes tie down, sometimes snap stems and branches. I’ve done scrogging before and it works well, but I don’t like that you can’t move the plants easily once they’re trained into the net.
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Agreed PITA.
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@DougDawson never pulls hardly a leaf off his batches of BOG gear and he grows some of the most beautiful plants I ever saw on here and has amazing yields.Sometimes I think it’s just about removing stress from the plant and letting them do thier own thing.When I think about it it seems counterintuitive to remove so much then the plant tries to put it all back instead of pumping out flower.I could be wrong just my thoughts.
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i uaed to never defoliate at all, because why would the plant make leaves that wont help it. but after i started i cant deny the improvement, even mild defoliation just to open the plant up to more light/air definitely makes a noticeable difference
this shwazzing seems crazy extreme but like i said people do report good results. ill try it on a plant next time i get growing again
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Thanks for the kind words @CapnCannabis. I have tried stripping plants before and it worked out fine although I did leave the very top. Looked like this.
Ended up with this.
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Those huge bushy males you had were spectacular just saying.Popping some Sour Bluetooth right now ,I have that pollen you gave me in Cryo storage and one of those ladies is going to get hit from tippy top to bottom with that and the purple Kush mom I have and of course the Texada.Your Male is becoming quite the Platoon Daddy for the north east lol.Thanks for the opportunity to put some good old school genetics back into the gene pool.
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That’s awesome bud. I love seeing my seeds and pollen put to good use. Up next is Blue Kush, it’s Blue Moon Rocks x Sour Bubble. Will be collecting pollen again if all goes well. 
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Cannot wait
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I’ve removed the odd handful of leafs to get on top of humidity, I’ve removed leafs from mother plants to slow growth down and feed frequency, I’ve removed the odd huge fan leaf to try and slow stretch, i don’t have direct comparisons so it’s only anecdotal but it helps i think.
I remove them for my benefits but doing it in the name of better yeilds/buds idk I’d need to try it.
Besides catching light leafs also absorb Co2, they transpire water which bringings up more nutrients, they store and make starches for growing roots and shoots.
Idk enough about all the science to know for sure but i can’t see how it could help the plant even though it might help us the grower.
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If anyone wants to read about the science behind defoliation, this is the best paper I’ve found on it as a practice. What I get from it is that selective defoliation of lower leaves and some uppers effects the plant metabolism and source-sink relationship between the leaf and buds.
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Actually, this one too, it’s one of the papers that cites the one above and has some interesting results:
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One link repeats the term “source sink” can anyone tell me what that means in layman’s terms?
Cheers
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I understand it like this:
Sources = Leaves, the plant’s machinery for photosynthesis, the energy that drives plant growth. “Sources” of energy.
Sinks = Buds, Seeds, the ultimate consumers of plant energy.
Source - Sink Relationship: determines the balance between the two components at each stage of the plant’s growth. The notion is that this balance can be manipulated so as to influence yield. Emphasize Sources during Veg. Emphasize Sinks during flowering by defoliation of older senescent leaves and non-productive lower branches.
A useful concept. One tool among many.
Make sense?
-Grouchy
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Yep! It works but you’ll end up with a LOT OF 
.
Last time I did this i got massive yeilds but twice the trim jail and small buds… but a fuck tonne of them~!
Look into a Scrog net kit that sits into your pot or bucket. 
Doug doesn’t seem to have any “sinker” leaves shown in photos. Aka, a leaf that’s taking away plant nutrients than contributing. I’m a plucker for sure, and go HARSH outdoors mid flower as it also keeps the chance of PM down in my area.
Edit: bahahaa! I replied before getting to the sinker part of the thread by @GrouchyOldMan ! 
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Yes! This is what I got from it too, that defoliation isn’t necessarily always benefitting our yields but that with a balanced approach of pruning lowers and moderate defoliation we can be doing some crop steering as flower begins, in the same way that we start changing light spectrums, feed ratios or supplements, or environmental conditions to steer the plant into making big fat buds and not leaves and stalks.
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@Star_Dog thanks for asking questions! That’s how we get a good discussion going on this stuff. I’ve been finding these charts useful for understanding the source-sink relationship in a visual way:
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Thank you @Dirt_Wizard a bit off discussion helps everyone understand it better, i don’t know much about the subject except my own observations but I’m open to learning.
At a point in my current grow i couldn’t get humidity under control, after thinking about it some i decided it would be fine for me to get less yeild (expecting the worst hypothetically) but provided i get humidity in check I’ll be more than happy.
I done it reluctantly but when I was finished and seen the difference 2 handfuls of leafs made to humidity i knew it needed more looking at.
Getting better buds and lower humidity, well that would be something!
Humidity is year round problem and expensive for me.
Cheers buddy.
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