Potsquatch
- 29
- 13
Curious how much other folks defoliate their plants. Feel like I always had a thick canopy choking out lower bud sites in the past, trying out schwazzing this round and so far the process feels pretty good. Enough to feel like I've converted from a "plants need every solar panel and nutrient store they can get!" mindset to a heavy defol true believer.
Note: these are Sweet Island sativas from seed in organic soil.
Schwazzing calls for a heavy defol on day 1 and day 20 of bloom. Here's day 1, after a timid attempt (could have trimmed off way more in hindsight; no "before" shots, sorry):
2 days later (bloom day 3)...
...and a week after that (bloom day 10):
Lush as ever! Been clipping plenty of individual leaves the whole time too. Took (admittedly not that heavy of a) defoliation like a champ. Just did the day 20 strip down, went a little deeper this time, basically cut any leaf I could get the clippers around and cleared out the base, leaving a few harmless bigger leaves on the edges:
I have a good feeling about how those lower bud sites will perk up, now that they have some real light and airflow hitting them. Will keep this updated to share progress.
Would love to see how others do heavy defols to help calibrate. Something tells me I'm still on the timid side (maybe too many small branches?), but so far it's definitely better than the previous full canopy method.
Note: these are Sweet Island sativas from seed in organic soil.
Schwazzing calls for a heavy defol on day 1 and day 20 of bloom. Here's day 1, after a timid attempt (could have trimmed off way more in hindsight; no "before" shots, sorry):
2 days later (bloom day 3)...
...and a week after that (bloom day 10):
Lush as ever! Been clipping plenty of individual leaves the whole time too. Took (admittedly not that heavy of a) defoliation like a champ. Just did the day 20 strip down, went a little deeper this time, basically cut any leaf I could get the clippers around and cleared out the base, leaving a few harmless bigger leaves on the edges:
I have a good feeling about how those lower bud sites will perk up, now that they have some real light and airflow hitting them. Will keep this updated to share progress.
Would love to see how others do heavy defols to help calibrate. Something tells me I'm still on the timid side (maybe too many small branches?), but so far it's definitely better than the previous full canopy method.