Mephisto Genetics Strawberry Nugs. Removing 2 fan Leaves?

[Haunts]

Would this work or is it going to cause more stress than removing it completely ?
Before

After

 

[gringuito98]

Would this work or is it going to cause more stress than removing it completely ?
Before

After

That‘s a lot better than cutting it off. You‘ll see after some days branches will have grown enough to release them leafs again. Well done!

 

[slowandeasy]

Have you tried to tie them down and possibly sideways too? I did that with success on bushy and squat plants before. Personally I try to avoid to cut fans on heavy indicas leaning strains ... but that‘s just me.

Good luck and happy growing!

Many heavy Indica based strains, especially BOG Genes, hate to have too much defoliation. Many small Indica plants have HUGE fan leaves. They often shade lower branches. I also agree to try and tuck vs pluck on Indica plants when possible. Now you can pony tail or leaf tuck. But cutting huge fan leaves on certain plants at a young age can stunt them. I personally would try to hold off, to see if he gets a little stretch. It can be hard to be patient with tight Indica plants. I ALWAYS start to defoliation from the bottom up. Pluck a few small bottom leaves before going ape shit on the massive ones. Sativa plants and most hybrids won't even blink any eye at light defoliation. I could strip some plants almost bare and they would thrive and have tons of leaves a week later. But try that on some Indica plants and you can have total shut down. Sour Bubble is a BOG STRAIN, I had for 15+ years. That strain had fan leaves bigger than your whole Face. Jungle like leaves. Awesome strain. But mess with it too much and it would not produce shit. It was not good with Rootbounding or defoliation. But then I could literally take every fan leaf off of the Sativa plant in same tent and it would thrive. I had some amazing yields with some strains I did HEAVY defoliation on over a decade ago. But they were all photo plants. I don't suggest doing heavy defoliation on Autos, unless you are familiar with the strain. Also defoliation can cause Bud Rot if people do it in flower. A good practice is to NEVER trim the leaves near the buds. If you pinch/trim leaves on some buds in flower too closely they actually "bleed" when you cut them and the moisture from this and the stem can cause Bud rot. If you leave a section of leaf stem, it won't rot. The stem will eventually dry up and fall off on their own.