@Meesh aphids. and ant farmers making more aphids. i’ll see at stunrise if there’s any ladies left but the ants are already thwarted by the borax it seems.
To control the plant you want to cut the newest/leading tip of the main stem & every branch when it’s about 1/2 the final desired size, almost daily it seems–definitely 1x/wk, until about week 2 of flowering.
Buuuuut… strains are varied; @Pedro_Bann yessir-- On the big Durban/RCB I used hedge-shears 3or 4 times, removing close to 2m/6ft, and STILL ended up way taller than planned. Crazy.
My first trial with that was a couple of years ago on the mother plant & it worked fine…saved a lot of time. Full disclosure: I took a tip from the weednerd who’d heard it/seen it done. To be proper about it requires some detailing later: i’ve got some dead stem tips in the canopy that never got dealt with but are only ugly…no rot.