Quick ? grow family?? Do you top autos or just let them grow out.
I accidentally topped one, and it produced almost exactly the same amount as a plant beside it with no training at all. So I’m playing with LST instead.
Wat is LST? Im new this grammer lol.
Low stress training like tying down your branches
There are several good videos about low stress training and other techniques.
While mastering the skills needed to keep plants healthy and happy, it’s hard not to get sucked into the exotic master weed grower techniques.
You ain’t ready. I’m a pretty smart guy who has grown veggies in climates as varied as New York and the Caribbean. I’m learning to grow weed well. I ain’t ready. Weed is touchy to do really well, and requires some basics to do at all. Stick to the basics until you master them. It’s gonna take a few grow cycles to recognize and be comfy reading your plants day you day.
A wise man told me, first grow, just don’t kill it and if you get smoke, yay. You’re learning.
Second grow, focus on getting your plants through the cycle. Learn how to optimize water, read and deal with too wet or dry, and how to keep the plant happily making oxygen and sucking up sunlight. You’ll learn to read leaves. When you cull and when you can fix, watering and nutrition.
LST usually means tying. If using fabric pots (5 gallon is my choice) you can poke a series of holes around the rim and tie pipe cleaners to your plant and the pot, to carefully bend the main stem over, faking it out so that the secondary branches become tops, and you get two or multiple colas on one plant. Look up LST videos.
Learn when and how to thin out fan leaves. It’s about ventilation and pest control.
Hint. Commercial fertilizer or plant food or whatever is sold to make a profit. They will lead you to use lots of product. I recommend fox farms ocean forest soil, fox farms happy frog soil to start seeds, and the fox farms liquid three pack. Use their schedule, and cut the dose in half. You need it. You need less than they say, but their timing is good. Expect nutes to extend growing cycles and increase yields if you don’t overdo it.
Don’t try for that big horse c—- looking cola on the first grow. Healthy, mature flower is the goal. Fine tuning will increase yield weight.
Here The main stem is shaped with pipe cleaner and a bamboo shrimp skewer as a brace so I didn’t snap it. A main stem pulled low such that as the secondary tops grow, it’s top is lower than secondary bud sites. This tricks the plant into making secondary’s into additional tops.
I had a scare where I thought the tying was choking branches, and freed it. The LST had by then created a second top bigger than the original. More advanced use of tying techniques can result in plants shaped like a menorah, with several “tops”.
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It totally depends on the strain some thrive after being topped others are very negatively effected, first run if they are get leggy I just LST them if you find them still heading for the top consider topping next run