Two questions: to clip fan leaves or not & does the black bag work?

[Agen36]

I've got a Hijack auto due to harvest in 2 1/2 weeks with large fan leaves-cut them off or not? She's doing well and I don't want to upset the apple cart. I've read opposing points of view on this and I'd appreciate the guidance.

I've got a Lemon auto that I'm growing with an 18/6 photo period. This plants leaves droop severely 3-4 hours before lights out and don't recover until several hours after lights on. I went to the web site and the seed bank recommends a 12/12 photo period for this strain for optimal growth. It just started blooming after 50 days and lightly at that-this should be a 60 day plant seed to harvest. I don't have another grow space and I was wondering if covering it with a black garbage bag to achieve a 12/12 wouldn't work. Has anyone tried this with any success?

 

[LivenBurn]

The plant knows when to drop its leafs w/o any outside help... you can bag it-- don't suffocate it, use a cardboard box or something else that won't drape on your plants...

 

[GigaGrew]

ok defoliation works very well at increasing your yield. however your so close to harvesting that you will not get a good reward vs shock by hacking at your plant this late in the game.

'black bag' method was never meant to be an actual black bag. but we have been using forced darkness flowering since the victorian times.
whatever you use, make sure your plants can breath well under there. consider piping air into the plants 'sleeping bag' when you do cover it. if you give the plant enough ventilation you could use anything you wanted to bock out the light, but mess with its co2/o2 exchange and youll probably kill it, it certainly wont thank you =)

 

[Agen36]

but mess with its co2/o2 exchange and youll probably kill it, it certainly wont thank you =)

OK, thanks for the advice!

I decided to use a black plastic bag. The plant is positioned under a metal tripod that prevents the bag from touching the plant, the bag is over the tripod with the bottom 6" of the pot uncovered. The whole unit is sitting on a black surface so there's no light bounce upwards. I'm assuming that's enough for air circulation-it came out from under today looking happy enough.

 

[GigaGrew]

should be fine...if you can get a tiny pc fan or something agitating the air a little bit that would be heaps better =)

 

[Agen36]

I've repositioned it on a desktop in front of a window which has a fan in it at the top sucking air out of the room. It creates a draft from under a door, opposite, strong enough to make a candle flicker. If I have to have a blunt, I sit at this desk 'cause smoke gets sucked right out. With the high skirts of the "black bag" there's positive air flow there.

Now mind you, what you warn against is a mistake I would have made 9 months ago- but I'm getting experienced as per your sig line.