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Super Cropping Marijuana: Simple Secret to Bigger Yields
by Nebula Haze
Table of Contents
Why Does Super Cropping Work So Well?
What You Need To Super Crop Your Cannabis Plants
Super cropping is the name for a High-Stress Training (HST) technique when you stress the plant by slightly hurting it in a planned way.
As a result, the plant will grow bushier, with more buds, and possible even higher THC levels! This is the plant's natural response to protect herself in the wild, in case things go wrong. As the grower, you can take advantage of this technique to get bigger yields and more potent buds!
Why Does Super Cropping Work So Well?
Cannabis is the only known plant that naturally creates THC (which, along with CBD and other cannabinoids, make these plants of particular interest to humans).
THC is the principal 'thing' in the cannabis plant that causes the plant's well-loved psychoactive effects. THC is produced mostly in the flowers of the female cannabis plants.
But cannabinoid-like substances are abundant in almost all plants and animals, including humans. In fact, humans and mammals naturally have a ton of receptors for cannabinoids throughout our brain and bodies.
If you've ever slept, eaten, forgotten, or relaxed, then you've used your Endocannabinoid system (yay for being a mammal!) and natural cannabinoids.
Ok, so why does the cannabis plant produce THC, which causes major psychotropic effects?
Did you know that THC is produced by the marijuana plant for protection?
Obviously it's not doing a great job protecting the plants from humans! :) (Or maybe it is good for them since we keep cultivating these plants...)
In the wild, deer and many other creatures might eat marijuana flowers which would prevent the plants from making seeds and reproducing.
Yet, as far as we can tell, most animals won't strip a whole marijuana plant of ALL her buds. Either they think cannabinoids taste terrible, or maybe they hate the effects. Therefore we believe the plants use THC as a way to deter predators.
Maybe the animals just forget what they're doing and wander off...
Because these plants use THC to protect against predators, when marijuana plants are stressed, they'll put their bud and cannabinoid production into overdrive as a last ditch effort to protect themselves.
Why is that all important?
For a marijuana plant, creating the prized cannabinoid-laden buds (which are used to make seeds) is their life's work.
As a cannabis grower, it's your job to understand what causes cannabis plants to produce the biggest, most potent buds possible.
So I'm going to let you in on a big secret to getting the biggest, best buds when growing marijuana...
While marijuana growers want to make sure that these plants survive until harvest, keeping them as absolutely healthy as possible in a 100% perfect environment without any special techniques won't get you the best results.
Instead, the best buds are produced when you learn how to stress the plants in just the right way to increase yields and cannabinoid production.
Which brings me to super cropping, one of the easiest, most effective ways to stress your marijuana plant for better harvests.
This remarkably simple technique will dramatically increase your yields, and all it takes is your fingers, duct tape, a bit of growing experience and the knowledge of what to do. It's based on the idea we just discussed of stressing the plant so she goes crazy with bud production.
What You Need to Super Crop Marijuana:
- Your fingers
- Duct tape
- A bit of growing experience
- The knowledge of what to do (jump to super crop tutorial)
STEP ONE: Choose the branches you would like to super-crop.
Super-cropping is best done during the vegetative stage, once the plant has grown many healthy branches and is growing vigorously, but before she is full into the flowering stage.
- For super-cropping, you want to choose parts of the plant that are old, but still pliable (sometimes called ‘bendy’). The parts you use this technique on should still be green, and not wood-like the bottom of the main stalk.
- If your plant has multiple colas, you should super-crop the same location on multiple colas. When there's only one main cola, you supercrop the pliable greener growth towards the top.
- Basically you're trying to create a flat canopy at the top, without any stems sticking up taller than the rest.
STEP TWO: Squeeze and bend branches
The idea is to damage the inner tissue of the plant without causing damage to the outside 'skin.' This makes the stem super pliable so it can easily be bent in the direction that you would like for it to grow.
- Grab the branch and squeeze with firm pressure between your thumb and forefinger. This helps "loosen" the joint you are about to make. You know you've succeeded when this part of the stem feels a little crushed.
- The branch should feel pliable at the joint you just made. Slowly and gently bend over stem towards the direction you want.
* For extra strong stems, you may need to maintain pressure at the joint while you slowly bend the branch back until you hear a or feel a slight snap. Then you can continue to step 3 if needed
This video demonstrates a grower squeezing the stem, then bending it over
Some growers just grab each branch and snap them quickly, but doing this makes it more likely you'll snap the outside tissue and need tape.
With that being said, cannabis plants are surprisingly resilient. If you don't bend the super-crop site hard enough, she will just bounce back to where she was in a few hours.
You know you've succeeded when the plant now appears somewhat 'broken' and now rests at a 90 degree angle where you bent her, and the branch stays down.
This illustration shows a perfect example of a super crop, one that
doesn't even need tape. Use tape if you go a little overboard.
If you bend her the perfect amount, her outside tissue will be mostly intact, but the branch will not be able to stand itself up, which is the best case scenario.
But even if you super crop too much or too gently, this process will cause her to grow a whole bunch of new colas, and leaves, because she doesn't want to put all her effort into one branch that (as far as your plant is concerned) has probably just been attacked by animals.
STEP THREE: Fixing any tears in the outside stem
In the best case scenario, you don't even need tape, because the outside of the plant is still whole.
- If you've gone a bit overboard, you may need to use duct tape (or another strong tape) to reinforce the plant so she can heal properly, especially if you can see a open slit or crack on the outside of the stem.
- Regardless, the place that you originally bent will grow a big 'knot' almost like a permanent band-aid, which can transport more water, nutrients, and other good stuff compared to before.
STEP FOUR: Removing ‘bandage’ tape
- Wait about one week before removing any tape. It's normal for the tissues to have discoloration at the healing sites.
- If the site is still grey and appears totally wounded, just put the tape back on until she has grown her protective 'knuckle'.
Until then, she'll be able to transport nutrients and maintain all normal processes as long as she has the tape to reinforce her.
If plant tries to straighten any branches, just tie them down (using Low Stress Training techniques). Stems will easily give in to your will after being super cropped.
FINAL RESULT: More buds, more branches, and a shorter, more controlled and bushy plant. Perfect for closet, stealth grows.
click for closeup
Unlike topping or extensively plucking leaves, super cropping does not dramatically slow down the growth of the plant (though you should expect to giver her a little time to recover), while giving you many of the same benefits of these other High Stress Training techniques.
Try super cropping today!
White Widow responds well to super cropping
About Nebula Haze
In response to the need for more tutorials aimed at new growers, Nebula co-founded GrowWeedEasy.com in 2010 with fellow grower Sirius Fourside.
Since then, Nebula has published hundreds of growing articles in print and online, and continues to dedicate herself to serving the medical marijuana growing community.
"My mission is to show other medical marijuana patients how easy it can be to grow weed out of your closet."
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Happy growing!
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