Advice with defoliation - Is it too late?

[chenzi]

Can anyone please advise on defoliating in flower ? I'm fast approaching week 7 flowering (Jack herer) and there is an abundance of leaf, which i am juicing presently. The question is ,can i take too much off ? And is it too late ?
I have read much on defoliating but much of it conflicting.
Please help.

 

[Cannbidoscar]

Id paperclip the fan leaves out of the way, seems like best of both.

 

[jojo677]

There's a lot of debate on this topic, but when it comes down to it, the leaves of your plant create and store energy which CAN (not always) be used in flowering. When you cut off a leaf, you are removing that energy and the plant has to spend some time repairing the cut site. BUT you expose lower bud sites, and give them more energy, so it's a tradeoff.

If you can, I'd tie them out of the way, as Cannbidoscar mentioned. I use wire and it works well.

 

[Hortus]

Strip as many fan leaves I mean proper open up all budding sites at this stage of the game you want as many buds getting decent light.

Ideally you want to start early with defoliation. I'd normally do a few during veg to promote more side colas then again on the 14th day of bloom and another halfway through so day 30ish. Here's my ice cream strain I defoliated last week, left her a little longer due to being busy with rl... But on her 21st day of bloom I stripped her of most if not all fan leaves

It's also recommend to leave the first two to fan leaves on the plant.

 

[chenzi]

Thanks Hortus, Sounds like a great idea but, access is limited( room to small) so I have defoliated the front two girls. Will post some pics when able. A total redesign of space is required to make everything more manageable. Also my first attempt at scrog, which it would seem that I let them veg too long,

thus the jungle !!

 

[Hortus]

Here's a before and after of my last scrog/defoliation just after its last defol this technique produced about 10oz of top shelf buds in a space no bigger than 8.5 sqft!

You kinda hit the ground running with a scrog it's not the easiest way to grow but your pulling it off. Its still looking really crowded in there if you can go in and clear out more fan leaves your buds will thank you for it by swelling in size

I'll dig out a link to a awesome defoliation guide for ya bud well worth the read.

Out of curiosity how much space have you got to work with in that closet?

 

[chenzi]

4ft by 4ft , so 16sq ft, 4 plants. I think i let em veg to long and didn't defoliate early enough to let everything develop properly.
I had to leave home whilst the stretch was on and my inexperience has cost me ? I will find out when i'm done, previously I have fluxed and did ok,(14.5 zips) from 4 buckets(non recirculating) ,so if i can't do better in this system it will feel like a failure.

 

[chenzi]

Cannbidoscar ,I like your thinking but......., Do you have a share portfolio in a paperclip company or what ?
It's so freakin busy in there man !!!

 

[EARTHWALKER]

pmsl chenzi. You are right though. You'd be talking boxes of paperclips..lol