Increasing yield with defoliation indoors: What's it mean? How to do it?

my summary of defoliation (for non autos) is that if your restricted in any way as to the amount of plants you can grow, then its a viable method to increase yeald thats up there with lst, topping and supercropping.

but if like myself, you can grow as many as you can grow....its pretty pointless.

by that, what i mean is a purely £$ basis.

a humans worth (in business) is calculated at a certain £ per hour, minimum wage is a nice easy calculation.
the cost of energy is another consideration.
and finally, i base my bud value on street value because of how much it costs me to buy.

my findings* are that the value of bud between a defoliated plant, working with 10 or more plants and non defoliated, is less than the cost of manpower+aditional energy(shock makes plants take longer).

so generally speaking if your a mass grower with only a bit of time and an aversion to a bad back...dont bother.

if however your a card holder that specifies plant quantity, then it really might be worth the effort involved.

even if you' decide NOT to defoliate as a general rule...the maximum benefit for minimum effort can be achieved with a single defol of the biggest and easiest accesible leaves, a week or two before flipping.

bassman's outlook may be totally different from mine tho, so hold fire on a descision till he speaks, this is his guide after all =)

*based on my observations of post defoliation shock
 
Generally speaking gig's comments above I agree with. Differences in opinion may lay around the 10 plant plus comment however. For sake of argument, let's consider end size first. Now, if it were a commercial grower with 30+ plants lets say, and growing them indoors, vert lighting, 4 foot tall or more, then it's going to be a shit ton of work. Yet I still believe they will see a substantial yield increase.

However, if it were 100 2L hempys, veged 10 days then I totally agree it wouldn't be worth the effort, but I have no experience with hempys either, just a calculated guess.

I also agree that an aversion to work or a bad back may not be conducive to this.

The initial longer time to harvest I pay no mind to at all because I always have a new grow behind the current grow. But that's not the case with everyone.

As far as your plant being ready to defoliate, you can go for it. But be forewarned, if you're in a small cab/closet, you may overgrow it too.
 
will post pictures after i defoil to my likeing hopefully wont stress it too bad but not like it takes long to get another plant to this stage

Agree.
 
he is my plant defoiled and toped if i did it right left the bottom fan leave on so hopefully new ones wont waste energy
1212091655002.jpg
1212091655001.jpg
1212091655000.jpg
 
hey bass couple questions, i finished up my tents last week and was surprised and a bit disappointed at my results, i followed your basic method with 4 plants vs 4 in a scrog the scrog yielded a fair bit more with less wattage there were to many variables for any real conclusions, but i was wondering if you felt like having a look at my results and incomplete conclusion post and see if you agree with me
or what you think in general heres a quick link thanks brother,btw:high-five: the grow looks great thus far!
 
Just Defoliated my grow room .. due to needing more vert space for my auto's in my dwc.... might even Defoliate my auto that are the main subject in my jounral.

These are Bubba Kush, Hindu Kush, and Kush Berry. They will be my little hidden veg machines.. plan on vegging them for over 2 month.. due to my auto grow... hope they stay small...
Before
IMG_054216.JPG

IMG_053910.JPG

after
IMG_054517.JPG

IMG_054419.JPG

IMG_054912.JPG


Thanks for sharing the great info!
 
Here's my most recent grow. I'm guessing a week before chop. heavily defoliated at day 21 of flower (and twice in veg) and more or less daily from there. These plants are grown about 6" too tall, not allowing proper spread of light and losing a little at the bottom because it's too far from the light. Still yield will be strong. Buds are rock hard and plenty frosty.

PC160030.JPG
PC160036.JPG
PC160050.JPG
PC160027.JPG
PC160040.JPG
PC1600021.JPG
PC1600151.JPG
PC1600161.JPG
 
Back
Top Bottom