My first grow. Based on just a gut feeling (Powered by impatience, perhaps), I topped my plant after the 2nd set of 5 point leaves. My theory was that the dual 5 pointers create complete radial coverage for light capture, so I get full light fuel to the site above that has been topped. Well, the lower branches have responded quite well also. Without any LST, the branches seem to be distributed quite nicely and able to acquire their own path to light.
MY QUESTION: I’m aiming for a bushy plant with as many colas as I can pull off. I plan to top any other branch after the 2nd 5 point leaf on that branch. How many times can I do this at once without over stressing the plant? Currently the plant has 4 sites that can be topped within probably 48 hours. Can I do all 4 at the same time and not stress the plant too much?
In my opinion there’s no wrong way to train a plant. I try different things all the time and some work great others not so much. Plants grow different from each other and because of this you can cut three plants the same way and get a different response from each one so the more plants you grow and play with the more you will know… my best tip would be if you have a plant that has a lot of node (sets of leaves) spacing you can get away with more topping and with closer nodes they shouldn’t be topped as many times because then the buds won’t have space between them and can lead to a mold problem. Buds need a little space between them because airflow is important one is the mold risk two weed is pollinated by pollen floating in the air and not by bees or other bugs so airflow will cause the plant to create sticky goodness to make catching pollen more likely, they do this even if there’s no pollen/boys around
Sorry for the book I’m on my third cup of coffee hopefully my babbling helps you out, good luck and welcome to the neighborhood
The most reliable way to develop a dense plant is to be sure to provide plenty of light. Be sure not to raise it so dense that light penetration and airflow become issues.
I top my plants 3 times before flipping them. Topping will create more colas.
Lots of colas is a good objective but not necessarily the most rewarding. You can literally top and prune them into a garden mum. It can have hundreds of nice but small buds. Try to get someone to help you trim that girl. The other factor is time. Each time it is topped or other form of HST, it takes time to recover and for new growth to take place. So somewhere in between a chrysanthemum
and single spired plants is a balance of plant size, and number of colas and the size of each colas.
To share a common thought I have after almost every harvest is this. I should have pruned this out. That stem did not grow as much as I thought resulting in smaller flowers. This ended up crowding that and therefore decreased both.
One of these days I hope to get it right - whatever right is for that plant and conditions.
Thanks for all the helpful comments. It sounds like I could do with topping those 4 sites at the slight risk of creating lots of smaller colas. I’d rather err in that direction on my first run just to know what the outside limit is. There are still quite a few weeks of veg left so still time to bulk up, particularly if I start implementing LST & trimming lower leaves in order to divert resources upwards. That’s the plan anyway The search for the Goldilocks method continues…
Thank you for taking the time to point that out. I was hoping that the sites you circled would be able to kind of elbow their way out, but I’ll keep an eye out in case some LST is required. The analytic side of me won’t stop trying to find the ‘Definitive Universal Formula’ for growing weed, that’s just how I am. I do recognize, however, that there is an element of sensitivity to the plant that is required, which is what makes this process so enjoyable.
I’m on my third cup of coffee 
hopefully my babbling helps you out, good luck 
and welcome to the neighborhood
