Olea europaea care after total leaf loss & fresh growth?

[Rivka]

I have a chunky shohin olive with only the beginnings of primary branching but a great root system. Sadly it got it’s leaves desiccated by some early winter dry wind and ended up dropping them all. I made the choice to make it a little greenhouse set up indoors near a bright cold window for the rest of the winter as this is a valuable newer tree for me and I was desperately hoping it had the strength to rebud.

Thankfully it was a trooper and burst forth with a huge set of basal budding everywhere on the main trunk and just turned it’s back on most of the smaller branches, not a big loss in the long term.

Now with a ton of growth, and I wonder if I should be doing some conservative branch reduction to help direct growth to a smaller set of future primary branches? or anything else to harness or direct this huge push?

Or after its defoliation should i just let it run wild for a year and cut back next year? I assume now is not the time to thinking to much about ramification? Or am i missing a good opportunity?

Should i still plan on repotting this summer? It is very due for a repot.

This is only my second olive, though I enjoy sucess with a number of other evergreen broadleaf trees on my benches. So im reading everything i can find on their nuances, any links you feel i should read are always welcome.

 

[achtungluchs]

Considering the wintering conditions you have right now, I would definitely hold off on pruning it at this moment, as it could weaken the plant. The internodes seem fairly long, olive trees need a lot of light. Being indoors near a window and additionally in a greenhouse might not provide enough light for it. As soon as it warms up, I would immediately move it to direct sunlight, or at least outside during the day and back indoors at night (if the temperature drops significantly).
I can see you have a good soil mix, which is great! I would also wait with repotting until it’s really warm outside, around early summer. That’s my take on it.

 

[Cadillactaste]

I'm just relieved it seemed to recover for you. Mine winters in my controlled cold greenhouse under grow lights all winter.

I don't think at this time I would worry about branch selection. Just let it recover. As it is done...wonderfully...thank goodness.

Honestly...I'm not pruning my olive back until it's got crazy long extentions. This one seems well compact in growth. New growth yes... but let it just go and grow...and recover.

 

[JudyB]

I think that I'd let it go for a little bit, until it's outside and warm. Then make some choices about what you want to keep depending on what is in the right spot. Then the plant can put all its energy into those chosen new branches, instead of all the new growth. They are resilient little buggers that's for sure. They also do develop fast, so that is at least a bright spot for you. I do think you could do a repot, but I'd suggest more of a slip pot to get it into something larger where the roots can expand and feed the new developing growth better. I had a really good thread about developing mine long ago, it was a fun tree, and so fast!

 

[Rivka]

Yeah I have concerns about the long internodes and just a general unfamiliarity with how olives ramify. Just so happy its happy and want to keep it that way.

I moved a grow light onto it and will start letting it spend its days outside protected from wind. Though its mostly just for hardening off, as the sun is pretty soft this time of year, so I’ll keep the grow light on it to help tighten the growth up.

In general growth terms, are Olea like some other opposite branched species in a that if you pinch back newly opening leaf buds you can trigger a pair to grow in it place? Or do they need the “let grow to X number of leaves and then cut back to 2 or so, rinse and repeat? Since I’m keeping this tree tiny (the trunk is currently about the volume of a tennis ball) it’s really as thick as it needs to be. So it’s more about creating enough leaf surface to keep it healthy long term. I assume with a broad leaf spread the thickening of the primary branches will slowly take care of themselves over time?

 

[JudyB]

You should look up the posts that Adair M has made about developing olive, he really has good hands on knowledge on them.

 

[Cadillactaste]

You should look up the posts that Adair M has made about developing olive, he really has good hands on knowledge on them.

That's great advice... as I'm still going to him on things. He had great amounts of knowledge with olive as well as pine.

 

[Cadillactaste]

Yeah I have concerns about the long internodes and just a general unfamiliarity with how olives ramify. Just so happy its happy and want to keep it that way.

I moved a grow light onto it and will start letting it spend its days outside protected from wind. Though its mostly just for hardening off, as the sun is pretty soft this time of year, so I’ll keep the grow light on it to help tighten the growth up.

In general growth terms, are Olea like some other opposite branched species in a that if you pinch back newly opening leaf buds you can trigger a pair to grow in it place? Or do they need the “let grow to X number of leaves and then cut back to 2 or so, rinse and repeat? Since I’m keeping this tree tiny (the trunk is currently about the volume of a tennis ball) it’s really as thick as it needs to be. So it’s more about creating enough leaf surface to keep it healthy long term. I assume with a broad leaf spread the thickening of the primary branches will slowly take care of themselves over time?

I will add this. You need to allow those branches to grow...to thicken, lignify before you think about cutting back. That is what I would do. If it were mine.

 

[Rivka]

thanks for this great feedback, I will go look up Adair M's posts and make sure I read them if i haven't

 

[Rivka]

• In the end i went in and cleared out select sprouts that were from the bases of already lignified branches that had survived and re-sprouted themselves. As leaving them would have resulted in unwanted structural conflicts long term thus they were easy targets.
• This was about 7 stems, about 15-20% of the new sprouts and nicely opened up the whole plant.
• I then gently guided some lower branches outward in the way I see a likely final design headed.

These two acts opened the tree up well, providing better airflow on all this new growth and more sun access to the parts I would like to most encourage additional budding.
The small open top glass tank that it lives in has been moved outside with full sun exposure and can easily be shuffled in to shelter if any late season frost threatens, but we are in a nice warm snap for right now, so it continues to grow like gangbusters.