Pruning Cannabis – When and How to Do It

Certain pruning techniques may boost the growth and health of many of your plants, and pruning cannabis is just one of the top methods to drastically improve your final harvest.

This technique involves providing TLC to your plant and trimming parts of it as it grows. Pruning keeps the crop neat and manageable and boosts its overall growth, quality, and yield size.

There are many advantages to cannabis pruning, but there are also risks and steps you need to take to get the best results. Keep on reading as we go over all you need to know to become a master of this technique.

Article originally published via our content partners at Homegrown Cannabis Co.

Shop for Seeds Now

6 main benefits of pruning cannabis

Many plants worldwide benefit from pruning, including cannabis. Pruning cannabis can do your crop a lot of good for several reasons.

The top six advantages are:

1. Boosts plant growth: Think of it like you’re trying to grow out your hair. Regularly trimming the dead ends encourages new growth. The same goes for pruning cannabis plants.
2. Removes damaged growth and promotes better airflow and light exposure: Removing the dead foliage and excess fan leaves and keeping the plant trim promotes healthier growth. The plant then focuses energy towards the critical parts.
3. Boosts yields: Use pruning to increase yield and gain healthier, more dense buds by harvesting time.
4. Increases carbon dioxide intake and reduces infestation risks: Your cannabis plant needs CO2. By improving the airflow, you give your plant more CO2 and prevent insects and pests from hiding among the foliage.
5. Makes the most of available space: Pruning cannabis helps in cases where you have a small grow area. By cutting away excess leaves and branches, you maximize the use of your space, allowing the plant to flourish without any obstacles.
6. It’s free and easy: Besides buying the cutting tool, pruning cannabis plants doesn’t cost anything. It only requires a bit of time and effort on your part.

Pruning makes the growing experience much more pleasurable for you and your plant. Let’s take a look at when and how often you need to prune.

When to prune cannabis plants

Deciding when to prune cannabis requires focus and attention on the grower’s part. Treating it like a baby with specific needs ensures you get a fully developed, healthy adult.

Timing is of vital importance. You do most of the pruning during the vegetation stage, with a little more maintenance during the start of the flowering stage. This technique is best suited for photoperiod plants.

Pruning cannabis starts during the second week of vegetation. You’ll see your plant developing nodes (growth tips) and internodes (the space in between nodes). The crop will be around the size of a standard 12-inch ruler and display several leaves.

Keep in mind that indica plants grow a bit slower than sativas. When judging when to prune cannabis, you may need to wait a few more days to start on indicas.

During vegetation, the plant is maturing, so you’ll be able to see which parts of the foliage you can remove. You’ll get an idea of its growth cycle and be able to cut off any hindrances to the growth.

You’re pruning to increase yield, so ensure that you stop around two weeks into the flowering stage. If you keep going after this, you prevent the plant from properly budding because it focuses on healing.

Let’s go into more detail on pruning your cannabis crop throughout its growth.

Shop seeds, grow supplies and more.

Pruning cannabis: Step-by-step

Pruning cannabis is a simple, delicate process and is essentially a fine art that you develop over time. Remember that performing the technique incorrectly could harm your plant. First, try pruning elsewhere if you’re not confident and worried about harming your valuable cannabis crop.

If you don’t mind potentially damaging a few roses in your garden, start practicing there. It’s not quite the same as cannabis pruning, but it’s good preparation for smoothly and carefully cutting your plants.

Don’t be hard on yourself if you mess up a little. It’s natural to make mistakes as it’s how you learn and improve over time. We’re here to help you.

In the following video, we’ll go over the basics of how to prune cannabis:

This article may contain affiliate links, for which we receive a modest commission that helps support our platform and our mission to provide news and educational content.