FatManatee
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I'm thinking that by defoliating, I can increase the surface are of leaves that can absorb light.
As the light is not blocked by the top layer of leaves, the light will penetrate within the plant and bounce back and forth around the foliage..
@Jack og, you made a good point with increasing airflow, I hadn't even thought about that. As cannabis is a wind pollinated plant, increasing airflow within the plant should help increase yields, maybe even more so then the added light penetration.
The light doesn’t bounce around the foliage it bathes it.
Light passes through leaves quite a bit. They are not solid to light. Different wavelengths pass through different amounts and the plant uses the leaves as a filter of sorts.
There is a limit to the lights effective distance though.
You nailed the term perfectly! "Bathing in the light" is a much more accurate term of what I was aiming for :)
I've done some measurements on how much the light passes through my foliage, at the top of the canopy I have a 1000 PAR right now, and the bottom leaves are receiving 10 PAR ratings, so the bottom leaves are not really able to photosynthesize at that point anymore, and require energy from other leaves to keep them operational.
To my understanding, all leaves should receive at least 200 PAR, so that they can sustain themselves through photosynthesis.
Conclusion is that my plants are way too tall at the moment. I still need more experience on my belt to know the exact time to flip the switch so that all leaves would get the minimum of 200 par. I guess this is why people lollipop too, but I think lollipopping is useless too if the plant height is kept correct. It's a useful method when plants have been let to grow too tall. As so is defoliating to get ight penetration for bottom leaves.
That’s right but defoliating won’t make indoor lighting effective farther away. And it’s the leaves not bud sites that need the most light for growth.
I keep my plants at 30” over the pot under 600’s so they bud almost all the way down. I bend most of them by week 2 in 12/12 to make bushes. Then train or supercrop to even the canopy and keep plants in the sweet spot. The lights are fixed up high and I use stands too.
View attachment 847662
Do you fill out the entire growth space while doing that? I once only had two plants running, which took around a 3x3 space in my 4x4 tent, I had 0% popcorn bud on that run, only giant cola's down til the bottom of the plant. I speculate it's because the light bounced through the tent walls to the bottom of the plant.
And yeah, I realize it's the leaves doing the hard work to increase bud size, not the buds themselves. Just thinking that most likely bud development is at it's best when the buds nearest sugar/fan leaves get the light, instead of having the plant transport the resources from the top to the bottom.
I just can't wait to do this test, I'm optimistic I can improve yields with defoliation, however I'm prepared for the harvest to be reduced too. It's really frightening to cut down the leaves, when I have not done so before (well a few failed tests when I was starting this hobby and had no idea what I was doing, lol), and it will definitely be a shame if this experiment fails. But yeah, you can't get better without experimenting :)
@3 balls
Yeah I've seen this "schwazzing" technique been mentioned on Royal Queen Seeds blog, and Growweedeasy. Haven't seen any side by sides on the topic, but IMO it really seems that it's a scam. Just doesn't make any sense that this would work, based on the knowledge I have on physics and chemistry.
It could be a great way to reduce stretching during flowering though, in tight spaces it might even increase yield to keep the plants short.
Maybe I'll try this in the future to see if it's a scam or not, so far I'm gonna be doubtful though :)
Well in that case, I triple dog dare you to try it on these.;)@3 balls
Yeah I've seen this "schwazzing" technique been mentioned on Royal Queen Seeds blog, and Growweedeasy. Haven't seen any side by sides on the topic, but IMO it really seems that it's a scam. Just doesn't make any sense that this would work, based on the knowledge I have on physics and chemistry.
It could be a great way to reduce stretching during flowering though, in tight spaces it might even increase yield to keep the plants short.
Maybe I'll try this in the future to see if it's a scam or not, so far I'm gonna be doubtful though :)
Looking spectacular! Your defol side by side has my undivided attention. I have the same problem with my plant on day 12 of flower but I have nothing like the bud sites on these babies. Keep up the fine work and GL.
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