10 Terms Used in Plant Training: Every Grower Should Employ Plant Training Techniques in Order of Effectiveness

10 Terms Used in Plant Training: Every Grower Should Employ Plant Training Techniques in Order of Effectiveness

Every Grower Should Use Plant Training Techniques

Your objective as a  grower is to maximise the efficiency with which your plants produce a large quantity of high-quality buds. When your plant is young, you can “train” it to grow wide and flat so that it will produce a lot of fat top buds when it is in the blooming stage. This is a significant strategy for enhancing yields and bud quality.

All plant training methods aim to produce broad, flat plants with lots of large top buds. Top-notch produce should fill your growing area!

Benefits of Plant Training: Increased yields, denser buds, and higher T H C levels in the buds.

The focus of today’s  plant training tutorial is on teaching you how to employ cost-free methods to increase the quantity and quality of buds produced by your present setup.

Achieve better bud quality and increase T H C levels with these free plant training techniques!

1.) Topping

Topping is the most crucial, straightforward, and efficient method for training plants. If you can only use one technique, pick this one.

“Topping” refers to removing the primary stem’s growing tip (or “top”) in order to promote the development of two or more subordinate stems. Whenever a plant is a few weeks old, a grower “tops” it. The goal of topping is to interrupt the plant’s apical dominance (decrease the propensity to form one main trunk), allowing it to grow spontaneously with multiple branches. A young plant should be topped to help it develop into a bushy, wide plant with lots of tips on which buds can develop.

Topping means cutting off the top of a plant when it’s a few weeks old.

The result: plants naturally grow more bushy, even if you don’t do anything else.

Topped plants naturally grow wider and bushier.

The result is many tops on each plant, and each of those top stems becomes a main bud.

2.) LST, or low-stress training

Low Stress Training (commonly abbreviated as “LST”) is a fancy way of describing “bending and tying down branches” LST attempts to mould the plant into the desired shape by establishing a more horizontal and even canopy, which encourages the growth of several buds as opposed to a single one. In addition to enhancing overall yields and bud quality, training plants to grow flat and wide helps give more light to more top buds.

Similar to topping, this method can also be employed on its own to boost yields without any further effort.

Plant before low stress training.

A plant after low stress training. Branches were bent down and away from the middle of the plant, then secured with ropes and garden wire.

At harvest, the plant has many big buds instead of only one.

3.) Supercropping

“Supercropping” is mostly used to completely control the height of exuberant plants by having the ability to bend even the most rigid branches without breaking them.  Nevertheless, the supercropping method entails pinching and bending the stems until they break internally but not visibly. The branches are secured where you want them to stay after the stem can be bent.

In addition to controlling height, supercropping leads the plant to develop a knuckle at the point of the bend, which, as an added bonus, in some circumstances may boost the flow of nutrients and hormones. By mildly stressing the plant in a “good” way, this approach may also have the ability to boost the strength of the buds. To avoid accidently breaking the skin and maybe killing the branch, take care to carefully follow the tutorial.

The safest way to bend branches at a sharp angle without “breaking the skin” is by supercropping. You now have far greater control over plant height thanks to this.

4.) Defoliation (Strategically Removing Leaves)

“Defoliation” refers to the process of removing fan leaves, which should be done carefully for the best results. The major objective is to eliminate large fan-shaped leaves that prevent light from reaching the bud sites in the early stages of flowering. This promotes bud development overall, helps the plants build a healthier structure, and facilitates airflow and light penetration. This method, which works best if you use our defoliation instruction, should be used cautiously because excessive defoliation might stress or stunt the plant.

Defoliation during the early stages of flowering refers to the methodical removal of fan leaves. After flowering has begun, plants often undergo strategic defoliation on a set timetable.

When done properly, strategic defoliation results in bigger, longer buds.

5.) Lollipopping

Using the “lollipopping” approach, the lower branches and leaves that get little light and develop little buds are cut off. The plant is essentially transformed into a lollipop without leaves at the bottom. The plant can concentrate its energy on the upper buds by removing the lowest leaves and bud locations that will never receive light. Lollipopping usually causes the topmost buds to enlarge and become more thick.

Plants before and after lollipopping. The right plant hasn’t yet been lollipopped, but the left plant has.

This was done right as the grower initiated the flowering stage. Notice how all the leaves have been removed from the bottom of the plant and light now reaches the floor.

Lollipopped plants produce big buds that go deeper down into the plant. Notice how the bottom branches are bare.

Lollopopped plants tend to produce bigger and better top buds, with fewer small airy lower buds that typically are not that potent anyway.

Practical Specialty Techniques

Contrary to the strategies stated above, which are helpful for all growers, these techniques may not always be the greatest option for achieving each grower’s objectives in each situation.

6.) Sea of Green (SoG)

The idea behind “Sea of Green” (sometimes referred to as “SoG”) is to use many tiny plants to grow a sea of buds. Small plants are grouped together and driven to flower early by being grown in close proximity to one another. The Sea of Green approach for growth shortens the vegetative period because plants stay tiny, resulting in quicker harvests and more harvests each year. This method functions best with strains that have a dominating main cola and in growing environments where it is simple to access all plants, even those in the middle or back. Despite the fact that Sea of Green is fairly efficient in terms of yields for the time and electricity used, it is not recommended for growers who are subject to legal plant limits because it typically requires more work than growing fewer plants.

Grow numerous little plants to create a “sea of green” and start the flowering process while plants are this small.

Each plant will grow one main bud and fill your space with produce.

7.) Manifolding (aka Main-Lining)

This method, which was once known as “main-lining,” is now known as “manifolding” since it is more descriptive and because “main-lining” has a different connotation in the pharma industry. When a plant is young, manifolding is the process of repeatedly topping the main stem to produce an equal number of primary colas that emerge from a single manifold. A symmetrical, balanced plant with evenly distributed nutrients and light is the result of this procedure.

Note: Autoflowering strains cannot be manifolded because their vegetative stage is too short.

The manifolding procedure offers a fantastic harvest of numerous large buds while also being a clever approach to learn about training plants. Every serious gardener, ought to try manifolding a photoperiod plant at least once, if only for the experience. Although it may not be the most scalable or effective plant training method, it is undoubtedly one of the most enjoyable!

Manifolding is a training regimen that causes the entire plant to grow from one main “manifold”. Manifolds are fun and interesting to make!

Example of a manifolded plant at harvest.

8.) Screen of Green (ScrOG)

Use of a screen or net to support and train the branches to grow flat and wide is referred to as “Screen of Green” (commonly abbreviated “ScrOG” – not related to Sea of Green technique despite the similar names). As the branches develop, the screen is weaved across them, resulting in a flat, even canopy that increases light exposure and bud formation. In some circumstances, creating a screen of green might be helpful, it’s frequently less work to utilise other ways on this page to build vast flat plant canopies. Inconveniently, once a plant is weaved through the screen, it cannot be moved until the screen is also moved. Also, it could be challenging to remove all the buds during harvest if the screen is made of wire.

(Less Useful) “Hit or Miss” Techniques

These training techniques are not consistent and should generally be avoided, or at least considered experimental.

9.) FIMming

“F*ck I Missed” is referred to as “FIM.” In essence, this method is identical to topping, but a little part of the plant’s top is left behind rather than chopping through the main stem. When someone made a mistake while topping their plant, FIMing was “discovered”. When done correctly, this can lead to the growth of four or more subsidiary stems from a single node. Unfortunately, it frequently fails to function as planned. While FIMing can produce 1, 2, 3, or 4 final stems, topping consistently divides one stem into two. Top the plant twice rather than FIM it if you want 4 main stems.

FIMing means removing 80% of the top node and hoping it results in 4 main branches (inconsistent and not recommended).

10.) Monster Cropping

The “monster cropping” technique involves taking clones from a flowering plant and reverting them back to the vegetative stage (“re-vegging” the plant). A re-vegged clone often grows strangely, with multiple branches and bud sites, creating bushy and monster-like plants. Some growers think this can be an easy way to make the plant grow many buds, but in reality, re-vegged plants grow slowly for a long time compared to seeds or regular clones. Almost any other technique on this page to make plants bushy gets faster and more consistent results.

A “monster cropped” plant. Note: a grower will likely get better results with almost any other technique on this page.

Bonus: Fluxing

Like manifolding, but more difficult and requiring more steps. This takes more time but produces results comparable to manifolding, therefore it is perfect for growers who appreciate the training and experimentation process with vegetative plants. Typically, manifolding a plant will yield the same effects with less work.

Fluxing is essentially a more complex version of manifolding.

Fluxing gives similar results to other techniques on this page that take less time.

Related article: How to conduct High stress training (HST)