Sucker Leafs

[peacefulfield]

Hey all, as you may know I'm a Tobacco Grower & I thought I would ask a question that is true for Tobacco growing.

 

When the Tobacco plant nears the end of its veg state (before flower) sucker leafs will start to form. Now a sucker leaf is called so because it sucks energy from the main leafs and makes them smaller.They grow between the nodes of the main leaf & stalk and branch out. They are really not leafs but stalks or shoots growing between the nodes. They do have small leafs on them. These are pulled to produce larger main leafs.

 

Now back to Cannabis, does anyone prune the what would be clone branches between the nodes. On a short say 6" veg plant to give more energy to the main stalk?

[Grow Thread]

Hey all, as you may know I'm a Tobacco Grower & I thought I would ask a question that is true for Tobacco growing.

 

When the Tobacco plant ends its veg state (before flower) sucker leafs will start to form. Now a sucker leaf is called so because it sucks energy from the main leafs and makes them smaller.They grow between the nodes of the main leaf and branch out.

 

Now back to Cannabis, does anyone prune the what would be clone branches between the nodes. On a short veg plant to give more energy to the main stalk. Also helping gain height so you can flower sooner?

 

not 100% sure what you are asking here............. but does this help?

 

 

i have been asked how i get my "trees" so uppity and top-heavy........... and how i keep the riff-raff lower buds/shrubbery away.

 

here we go:

 

this plant is a hybrid. about 70/30-65/35 indica dominant. she grows tall, but grows HUGE/dense buds as well. when i flipped the lights to 12/12 on her, she was about 19-20" tall. that was on 9-17. like 10 days ago. she is standing about 32" now. the stretch has been on, but there is still a bit more before we are done.

 

this is a PERFECT time to do a "final pruning" on your trees.

 

here she is:

 

ok, looking a little shabby along the bottom. i have not taken any clones from this plant. this plant is in a system with a bunch of others..... therefore, it can kind of get forgotten about from time to time as far as cleaning goes. anything that has come off the bottom up to this point was totally dead, brown, and actually fell off on its own.

 

this will be the first time that i am really getting in with some clean scissors and doing some damage.

 

i took the bottom 4-5 branches off. at this point in life, its pretty easy to tell what branches have grown/strectched up far enough to produce anything. all others must go. i also stripped the remaining branches of any old fan leaves or new shoots. there is just no sense in your plant wasting time/energy making growth way down here. this "scrub" is not taking in light..... therefore its not helping.

 

here's some after pics:

 

and here is what was actually taken off the plant. its quite a bit..................

 

from this point, until harvest day, the only leaves that i will be plucking will be more than 50% dead and already dying.

 

before and after:

[peacefulfield]

Yea sort of, you prune the bottom for air flow and so that more energy is forced up top. But you say you do this in the beginning flowering stages only? What about when its short veg plant less than 12" no pruning?

[Grow Thread]

as stated in the post, this plant was neglected during the entire veg period. everything that you see dead/missing along the bottom was natural....... before i got ahold of her

[SublimeWind]

Bubs, in the last few pics above, the lower leaves kinda look like what is happening with me, but at a more extreme rate..(mine)

[Grow Thread]

since these buckets grow the plants much faster, the leaves towards the bottom "get spent" and die quicker. what you see above is 100% totally normal and healthy.

 

i do not prune in the veg period unless i am taking clones. in veg, the plants are obviously shorter, and light is penetrating all the way to the bottom branches.

 

after/during the 2 week stretch, everything down there gets cut off. as stated, there wont be any buds of worth growing way down there, and by now, the plants are so tall that the light is not getting down there either. it becomes like a parasite all take and no give

 

so i chop it off.

[Grow Thread]

Bubs, in the last few pics above, the lower leaves kinda look like what is happening with me, but at a more extreme rate..(mine)

 

here's some better ones. this leaf is actually still on the plant. very bottom. its just dying. no harm, no foul. perfectly healthy plant. just a used up leaf

 

it's now about 50% dead IMO and this is when it gets plucked off.

 

 

 

[peacefulfield]

 

i do not prune in the veg period unless i am taking clones. in veg, the plants are obviously shorter, and light is penetrating all the way to the bottom branches.

 

after/during the 2 week stretch, everything down there gets cut off. as stated, there wont be any buds of worth growing way down there, and by now, the plants are so tall that the light is not getting down there either. it becomes like a parasite all take and no give

 

so i chop it off.

 

 

So why even wait until the bottom unusable stalks/clones get big? Why not pluck them early on? Seeing that they will be future parasite's anyway. Just like the second I see sucker stalks/leafs on Tobacco plants I pull them ASAP.

[kruztydj]

Trim before ya flip them to bloom and dont touch them again. The buds get all there food from those leafs so yeah ya need them. You can trim all ya want in veg as it's just vegg'in and will regrow the leafs. Bloom is where ya need them to feed the buds your after.

[THC-Farmer]

This has been discussed in great detail many many times.

 

http://michiganmedic...flower-opinion/

 

I stand firmly against trimming and pruning of healthy leaves.

 

There is seriously no need to remove healthy leaves. In fact, removing healthy leaves is anything but beneficial. It is bad for the plant any way you cut it.

 

First and foremost there is no such thing as a "sucker leaf", a "water leaf" or any of the other old hippy terms for the Photosynthetic leaves. All those terms and "techniques" are all old hippy tales aka Science Fiction. The leaves on ALL plants serve 2 purposes mostly, 1- Collect Solar Light energy and 2- Provides the plant with a way to exhale or exhaust the spent molecules (oxygen) after Photosynthesis has occured via the Stomata...

 

This is Science Fact.

 

Consider the leaves as Solar panels collecting the Light energy and providing that energy to the plant for Photosynthesis. The leaves provide the plant with this energy so it can split Molecules to create the necessary Sugars to construct the Cellular growth. The more solar panels the plant has, the more energy the plant can provide for Photosynthesis, thus resulting in more vigorous growth. As soon as you start removing those leaves from the plant, the plant will slow down, or completely halt growth all together depending on how much is removed, in an attempt to recover the loss of "solar panelling" because it can no longer support the growth it has already constructed with the amount of leaves it had before they were carelessly removed.

 

Removing healthy leaves will only slow the growth of the plant down and in extreme cases will even stunt the growth severly. This in turn will reduce your overall growth rate and will inevitably be detrimental to your overall yield as well.

 

Granted, removing a leaf or two isn't going to have a terrifyingly noticeable affect, but regardless the fact is, the more you remove will indeed slow the growth. The more leaves that are removed the more the plant has to recover and that recovery or regrowth of leaves stunts the overall growth of the plant.

 

Now removing leaves that are unhealthy or not needed by the plant is perfectly acceptable and is good practice (illustrated above by BubbleGrower). Typically these are the yellow or brown leaves that appear to be dying naturally and not of deficiency; occaisionally some plants will indeed drop a few leaves that are either not getting enough light to photosynthesize or have been used to it's full potential and the plant has stopped providing water and nitrogen to the leaf. It's best to allow the plant to decide what it needs and what it doesn't. It will grow much more natural and express much more vigorous growth this way.

[peacefulfield]

OK I will just lay this to rest.. I'm not talking about pruning the bottom fan leafs before flower. Or any fan leaf for that matter. I think the title sucker leaf throws off what I'm asking here. Anyway BG has pretty much confirmed my question.

[THC-Farmer]

Either way there's no such thing as a "sucker leaf"...

 

Leaves don't suck energy from ANY portion of the plant. They provide the energy TO the plant. That's my point.

 

The leaves either provide energy to the plant or they dont. If they don't, they die and fall off.

[peacefulfield]

Their is such thing as a sucker leaf in Tobacco not Cannabis. Its really not a leaf in Tobacco that does this its the shoots. Their are small leafs on the shoot. Which is why they are called sucker leafs.

 

I agree with the don't pull leafs statement. But I'm talking about the unusable clones or stalks that you see in BG photo (not Leafs). Why not pluck them early in the veg state to give the plant more energy to the main flower stalk. I truly give up if no one understands what I'm talking about here.

[THC-Farmer]

Either way it will reduce your overall yield.

 

Removing branches reduces potential bud sites, thus reducing overall yield.

 

Removing a few of the smaller lower branches isn't going to impact your overall yield dramatically, no. But it will inevitably be reduced, technically...

 

There's no real benefit to doing this with Cannabis plants.

 

Outdoor growers will remove some of the lower branches to help keep pests off the plants. But it's not going to increase your yield or the plants potential. You're taking away from the plant. It's not going to reward you for that.

[peacefulfield]

Either way it will reduce your overall yield.

 

Removing branches reduces potential bud sites, thus reducing overall yield.

 

Removing a few of the smaller lower branches isn't going to impact your overall yield dramatically, no. But it will inevitably be reduced, technically...

 

There's no real benefit to doing this with Cannabis plants.

 

Outdoor growers will remove some of the lower branches to help keep pests off the plants. But it's not going to increase your yield or the plants potential. You're taking away from the plant. It's not going to reward you for that.

 

 

I'm going to agree to disagree with you on this........... What good is a flower doing in the shade? When you can force the energy of the plant into the light.Unless you plan on having some intense side lighting.

I will agree that after the flower stretch period pruning is a no no. Other than the dead shade leafs as they die.

 

I'm not in any way trying to tell anyone how to grow. I'm just giving my opinion on something new to try. If it works for you great if not great. If no one try's to experiment then we never would have a bubble bucket/aeroponics or hydroponics at all. I'm sure the first person that invented Aeroponics was told it would never work.