Tucking Leaves

I've somewhat started to make it a habit of tucking leaves, mainly the fan leaves, to increase light availability underneath along the main stem. Should I leave it alone or is this normal practice? I've been doing LST and actually both my plants are growing nicely sideways but the fan leaves are light hogs. I did have a bit of a mishap last night so that may have lost them a good half day of growth but I guess I am just being impatient for that undergrowth to grow in. They are both 21 days old now growing underneath 3 23w (100w equiv) CFLs. Its a stealth PC grow so I am not expecting something huge but I am really drawn to the growth day to day.

Hi mate think of you fan leaves as power plants they capture the light and turn it into yummy grow juice let them soak up the light. If they are shading a bud you can tuck them aside, But just try to make sure you have a few fan leaves facing the light.
some pics would be nice to cheers

Learn about the inverse square law. Getting light lower in the plant is counterproductive indoors.

smokinrav said:

Learn about the inverse square law. Getting light lower in the plant is counterproductive indoors.

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Care to elaborate?

balactus said:

I've somewhat started to make it a habit of tucking leaves, mainly the fan leaves, to increase light availability underneath along the main stem. Should I leave it alone or is this normal practice? I've been doing LST and actually both my plants are growing nicely sideways but the fan leaves are light hogs. I did have a bit of a mishap last night so that may have lost them a good half day of growth but I guess I am just being impatient for that undergrowth to grow in. They are both 21 days old now growing underneath 3 23w (100w equiv) CFLs. Its a stealth PC grow so I am not expecting something huge but I am really drawn to the growth day to day.

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I do the same every morn.works fine for me.And have been for yrs letting future budsites clear fan leaves then stop.

SOMEBEECH said:

Care to elaborate?

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Sure, it's saturday. I'll do the legwork for ya.

The ISL is a law of physics governing light emanation and used mostly in photography, but it applies to indoor growing as well. Basically it states that when your subject (the leaf) is twice as far away from the light source, it takes four times as much light to have the same effect. So by moving the large surface area of the fan leaf away in order to get light to smaller surface area leaves further away, you actually are costing the plant photosynthesis. Those poor suckers who remove their fans entirely are doing serious damage to their harvest numbers.

You can remove lower growth that will obviously not harvest much (sucker stems we call them in tomato growing)

balactus said:

I've somewhat started to make it a habit of tucking leaves, mainly the fan leaves, to increase light availability underneath along the main stem. Should I leave it alone or is this normal practice? I've been doing LST and actually both my plants are growing nicely sideways but the fan leaves are light hogs. I did have a bit of a mishap last night so that may have lost them a good half day of growth but I guess I am just being impatient for that undergrowth to grow in. They are both 21 days old now growing underneath 3 23w (100w equiv) CFLs. Its a stealth PC grow so I am not expecting something huge but I am really drawn to the growth day to day.

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Do you want to know a secret, It might be on this sight but I never read on any post yet.. So that a side, here is what you want to do.. To get light naturally to your Plants. Put a fan in your grow area set it to medium strength then don"t point right on your plants but experiment till you get it so it moves your plants real vigorously . So it moves leaves like it was being grown outside. Then by a real 200 watt CFL.. 23 watt are only good for supplemental lighting But a real 200 watt is what you want there 85 bucks.. http://sungodlights.com/ Tell Ken down there Michael from Colorado told you to call. There you go now you won't be trying to tuck and fuck your plants.. scrogg is another story about tucking.. No charge..

Tucking leaves strategically can be beneficial, certainly 1000 times more useful than cutting them off.

Its like when you're home alone, and you tuck your balls under the back and walk on front of a mirror pretending to be a woman. Saying things like "oo you so sexy" etc while cupping imaginary breasts. Doing weird things can bring positive effects. Or maybe its just me...

RollupRick said:

Tucking leaves strategically can be beneficial, certainly 1000 times more useful than cutting them off.

Its like when you're home alone, and you tuck your balls under the back and walk on front of a mirror pretending to be a woman. Saying things like "oo you so sexy" etc while cupping imaginary breasts. Doing weird things can bring positive effects. Or maybe its just me...

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You sir have a twisted sense of humor and are an inspiration.

patlpp said:

You sir have a twisted sense of humor and are an inspiration.

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haha ya thats fucked up but feels so right lol

Amen to that my brothers, nothing wrong with it at all. Its not creepy at all ... unless you lick your lips while raising one invisible knocker, sometimes you can't help but realise you've gone too far.

My life philosophy is the same as that I have with my plants ... keep it simple, fpmsl

RollupRick said:

My life philosophy is the same as that I have with my plants ... keep it simple, fpmsl

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Some of the best smoke I ever had had grown wild in the backyard of a house in El Paso. The yard had been there since the 30', not cared for since God-only-knows-when and the only water was monsoon rains and water blown from neighbors sprinklers. Went to haul boxes of trash at night as a favor when a tenant had been evicted. He had obviously thrown a ton of seeds out back and never opened the backdoor again. It was October, there was over 100 plants with all these little buds, frozen a few days before. Not a fan leaf hardly at all. Tried to pull them. They were all like a foot tall with nothing over 18". No dice, no pulling out of that dry ground. I had to go buy tin snips to cut them all off and put them in a garbage bag. Ended up with a boot box full of buds the size of little kiwi fruits and smaller. Red and deadly. Free.

smokinrav said:

Learn about the inverse square law. Getting light lower in the plant is counterproductive indoors.

Click to expand...

Oh pick me! Pick me! The energy twice as far away from the source is spread over four times the area, therefore one fourth the intensity. If the source is measured from 1 meter then at 2 meters the the light will be 1/4 as much

I love astronomy...

lol, that's a better explanation than mine, and in half the words.

RollupRick said:

Amen to that my brothers, nothing wrong with it at all. Its not creepy at all ... unless you lick your lips while raising one invisible knocker, sometimes you can't help but realise you've gone too far.

My life philosophy is the same as that I have with my plants ... keep it simple, fpmsl

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Dude id love to smoke a bowl with you, your killing ME Rofl.

smokinrav said:

Sure, it's saturday. I'll do the legwork for ya.

The ISL is a law of physics governing light emanation and used mostly in photography, but it applies to indoor growing as well. Basically it states that when your subject (the leaf) is twice as far away from the light source, it takes four times as much light to have the same effect. So by moving the large surface area of the fan leaf away in order to get light to smaller surface area leaves further away, you actually are costing the plant photosynthesis. Those poor suckers who remove their fans entirely are doing serious damage to their harvest numbers.

You can remove lower growth that will obviously not harvest much (sucker stems we call them in tomato growing)

Click to expand...

Duh,KISS has no effect on what post is about.