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Issue #407 - Sunday, February 2, 2020
Dear Fellow Grower,
In today's issue...
- Defoliation. When we first started growing, the word alone was enough to start an argument or two. These days, most people are on board with it, but how do you defoliate correctly? If you don't already know, you will be a pro after today!
- Get an update on my LEDs vs LEC grow journal! They've just started flowering :)
- We were bombarded with a crazy amount of awesome trophy pics this week and it was really tough to pick one. Instead, I choose pictures from 3 growers for various reasons and you know what? I think you'll like 'em, too!
Nebula Haze & Sirius Fourside (founders of GrowWeedEasy.com)
"Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live,
it is asking others to live as one wishes to live."
~Oscar Wilde
Nebula's 2020 Defoliation Tutorial!
🌲🤏🍃
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It’s short, sweet, and to the point. You can use it on ANY plant in any setup, including autoflowering strains. As long as you follow the 3 steps, you won’t take any risks, and you will get great results.
Defoliation is the process of strategically removing leaves from your plant so that it grows in a way that’s more optimal for an indoor cannabis grower.
Defoliation means strategically removing leaves from your cannabis plant. This article focuses on defoliation in the flowering stage.
Quick defoliation example: This plant is at week 3 of the flowering stage (3 weeks of a 12/12 light schedule). Light and air are not getting into the plant.
Post-defoliation – never defoliate more than this unless you already have experience with defoliation!
The plant was left alone after that. Here is the result at harvest
Notice how there are no small or airy buds on the entire plant
Let me explain what’s going on here and how to do this yourself.
What defoliation does if you follow these instructions:
- Healthier plants – Defoliation helps reduce the chance of bud rot or white powdery mildew on a plant that tends to grow bushy. This tutorial shows you what plants look like when defoliation is going to be helpful, and when it’s better to leave your plant alone.
- Lower humidity – Since each leaf is continually adding water vapor to the air, defoliation decreases the overall humidity of a grow space. That could be a good or bad thing depending on your local environment, but it’s common for growers to struggle with high humidity in the grow space once plants start getting big with tons of leaves.
- Better airflow within the plant – Lack of airflow is associated with problems like mold and pests. Air doesn’t travel easily through a bushy plant.
- Denser buds – If you follow the instructions as written, defoliation reduces the number of small, airy buds that often get thrown into the trim pile after harvest. No one wants tons of tiny, wispy nugs! In my experience, defoliation helps ensure all buds at harvest are weighty and dense.
- Longer primary buds – Proper defoliation allows light to penetrate further down into the plant, and buds are typically longer as a result. With very bushy plants, buds are often only an inch or two tall. We want foot-long colas!
What defoliation has not been proven to do:
- Increase yields – I believe that defoliation increases yields when done correctly. However, this is based on my feelings from years of experimenting with different levels of defoliation. I’ve never done a side-by-side experiment, and have never seen a defoliation test documented by anyone else. That means there is no objective proof that defoliation increases yields. That being said, if you follow the instructions below to a T, you
will get great results, and you will achieve the factors listed above. I’ll show you picture-proof of what happens when I defoliate so you can decide for yourself.
These plants are so bushy that the entire bottom half is in shadow. Light and air are not penetrating into the plants at all.
How does defoliation work? There is a lot of debate on the actual mechanism that’s causing the changes people see from defoliating their plants. This defoliation
article goes into the theories, but today I’m focused purely on the practical application and showing picture-proof so you can decide for yourself if it seems like something you want to do in your garden.
What’s the Big Deal with Bushy Plants?
Plants with too many leaves for their size often raise the humidity of the grow space above appropriate levels. High humidity often triggers problems such as:
- mold or mildew
- bud rot
- pests
- poor bud development
No one wants any of that!
Buds that are hiding in the shadows also stay small and airy. The following plant was manifolded (notice the base), which usually helps prevent airy buds, but the plant was never defoliated in the flowering stage. Although the top few inches of buds thickened up beautifully, every bud that grew below the thick canopy stayed small.
Check out the buds that didn’t get light or air in the flowering stage.
All the hidden buds became tiny wisps of white hairs with no substance (this is a closeup of the same picture).
Proper flowering stage defoliation reduces the number of tiny buds getting thrown into the trim pile, so all the buds you do harvest are more likely to be thick and chunky.
LEDs vs LECs Grow Journal Update
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I am in the middle of another side-by-side grow, this time featuring LEDs vs LECs!
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January 4 - Just put in tents
This is how the clones looked on January 4, a few days after being put in the tents. LED tent is on top, LEC tent is on bottom.
Grow details:
- Grow Space: Each light is in a 2'x4'x6' grow tent
- 6 Plants Each: The plants are clones of each other for the purposes of the experiment
- Plant containers: 3-gallon fabric pots filled with Mother Earth Coco + Perlite mix
- Nutrients: General Hydroponics Flora trio at half strength plus CaliMagic at full strength.
Flowering Day 1 - January 18
This is when the plants started getting 12/12. LEDs on top, LEC on bottom. They were all between 11-13" tall.
Flowering Day 15 - February 1
They've been on a 12/12 schedule for 15 days and all the plants have started making buds.
The plants under the LEDs are a bit shorter than plants in the other tent, but have less space between sets of leaves. More manageable. I'm very pleased with the canopy and how they look in general. I haven't really had to do anything to shape them since I put the plants in the tent. They've been growing closer to the light without any signs of stress, so I haven't been moving the fixture up. Currently about 22" away and plants are thriving.
The plants under the 315 LEC/CMH are taller but stretchier, with longer amounts of stem between sets of leaves. That's okay as long as those long branches turn into long buds! I have the fixture about 20" away from the plants. The top leaves are starting to show signs of stress so I'll probably move it up a few inches today.
The plants look neck and neck so far. Buds seem to be about the same size in each tent. The plants are fully into flowering and I can't wait to see what these lights will accomplish. Stay tuned for more updates!
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"No pictures but have read and used your advice for a long time now. You've given me confidence to try new things and entertained me while educating...something rare!👍 Just wanted to take a moment to express my deep gratitude at the excellent work you do and the friendly easy to understand way you present the information. Good wishes being sent for your happiness and endeavors!"
~Alan
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"Hi Nebula & company
im a 2nd time grower, new custom stealth cab i built with LED lights, shes 2'x1' (1st cab was about 6 years ago, HPS, heat problems, not too successful)
i love your website, ive read a lot of your articles, think your stuff is great. thank you!
how do you think my Nothy looks?! shes about 12 days into flower. shes a Gorillaz Skittlez. cant take 3/4 shots of her cuz of stupid crossbar i put in cab, but shes about 6" high
continue great work!"
Tyler Durden
"Looks great! T he plants look happy and you did a fantastic job on that custom cabinet."
~& company 😂
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Who Runs This
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Nebula Haze:
I'll be honest with you, when I first started growing, I struggled. Now, it is my mission to make it easier for
new growers to get started as well as help advanced growers get bigger, better yields with less time and money. We are updating and adding articles every single week and our goal is to eventually build a comprehensive growing resource so anyone and everyone can grow if they want to! If we all share the knowledge there's more buds in the world for everyone :) |
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Learn which seed sources are personally recommended by Nebula Haze |
Sirius Fourside:
Sirius Fourside is a hobbyist grower who has gained the bulk of his experience growing in water as a medium (deep water culture, bubbleponics).
"Growing cannabis can be a relaxing hobby in and of itself, but it also saves you money and keeps you from having to deal with shady characters. Cannabis is much easier to grow than people give it credit for, and growing in water doesn't increase the difficulty much, if any. But whether you want to grow in water, coco, or a different medium, we'll show you how easy it can be!"
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