As Adair stated, azaleas can be chopped back to absolutely nothing and bounce right back. They are really tougher than they look and will respond with tons of back budding. If you look at some of my threads and those by John Geangle you can see how much abuse they can take. This one, for example, I chopped it late in the season, cut most of the roots, hacked to nothing, and it still managed to bloom.
It was mentioned that I could have cut it more, and I could have, but I think I could make the ones I chose work in the design, I could always cut it back more later if need be. Most of these were left just to make sure that parts of the trunk did not die.
I plan on leaving the roots alone for a while until it gets close to the final design and a smaller pot.
I don't know what the name of the paste I use is, it comes in a yellow tube that has all Asian writing on it. I does a good job as long as the area isn't too large or the tree is bleeding. For those areas I use latex caulk, Home Depot, $2 for more than you can use before it dries out.
Thanks Darlene and Adair, if you have azaleas, post them up.
John
