Starting an azalea

[berobinson82]

Mr. Geanangel and I have moved our conversation to PMs as is appropriate.


That being said, I'm still not giving up on this azalea thread! There were so many interesting trunks at that nursery. Perhaps experimenting with a more drastic and a slower method would be prudent. Perhaps in 3 - 4 weeks, the weather will be more suitable for surgery.

 

[biglou13]

i'm in Fla, azaleas love it here. Central va may differ.

i'd repot now, roots have probably filled the nursery container, crowded roots is asking for problems, depending on your weather now is a good time to repot. in stead of full root comb out, cut off some bottom, and a few wedges around, next year more wedges to complete. fill with good azalea friendly mix (mine is turface, grit, pine fines, a little peat) they like acid fert, and ocassional shot of iron.

they also do well in smart pots

chances are its not an satsuki. most take chops well. and bud back like crazy. its possible to do both with experience, safer to separate operations.

Happy roots make for healthier tree. you could air layer off the branches you plan on chopping, i had 100% success with formosa azalea. you'll be amazed how well a healthy azalea will bud back.

check out this site http://satsukimania.net/

 

[MattB]

Love me some forum drama threads!!! lol

On topic - That tree appears to have some pretty cool potential, especially in the trunk... be patient with it. It is not easy to find a good trunk on an azalea. I apologize if its been said somewhere in here, but do you have any idea what the flowers look like or the variety of azalea it is? You said nursery bought...any tags? There are literally hundreds of varieties of azaleas and each one can have a different cold hardiness. Make sure you protect it for the next few weeks, even more so if you repot now.

I've noticed in the past that our rhododendrons and garden azaleas in this area (6a) do fine when cut back. Lots of options for trunklines and it is hard to see what is what through the pictures. I'd suggest having a local club member take a look at it and see what they think. If it is in crappy nursery soil, your priorities may be to get it into some better soil before even considering any severe pruning. Don't over stress the tree and read up on some azalea care...its a bit different than other species you are probably familiar with. Also, check out Bonsai4me. Harry has a pretty good little section on when and what to do to an azalea.

Keep us updated, good luck.

 

[Harunobu]

It is not the soil that is the reason ti repot. It is that it is surely terribly pot bound. Rootball needs to be raked apart.

Judging from the plant habit and flowers I am pretty sure it is a cultivar in the R.kaempferi curner of things. So that's probably 4 to 7 cm flowers.
If you want to be safe you want it to have new growth close just below the branches you want to remove. But judging from the plant habit it probably won't grow that by itself. R.kaempferi hybrid cultivar are significantly less basally dominant than for example satsuki.

If you want to play safe you can seriously prune most of the tree but without removing the problematically far branches. Cut them back to the first secondary branch/first foliage. Then hope it buds back at the right spots so you can safely remove the large branches next year.

Then just remove everything besides the trunk line and the new growth next year.

If it doesn't bud back, you can try a thread graft. But if this wasn't a relatively old azalea with a relatively thick branch and of a cultivar that doesn't grow wider than it growth high, I would advice you to just remove it.

 

[daytona1911]

azaleas tend to die down to the roots if cut too big too fast. You can do it in stages over 3 years and not have massive die back, but you need to ask yourself a few things first. Is it potbound? If it is , it wont have the vigor to heal over and will likely die back down base as stated. What mix is it in? Mostly peat based? If that is the case, you'll have to remove all of the old soil and put in bonsai soil ( and I mean ALL of the peat or you'll get root rot down the road) Take a hose to it and carefully work out the roots till it is barerooted, but try to keep the coarse feeders to help it re-establish . The fine mat of roots in peat is difficult to retain and doesnt drain through anyway. Is this a "little John"? If so, they like more sun than satsukis. But most should be partially shaded after heavy root work for a few wees till good growth starts. And some varieties like partial sun throughout most of summer. Don't do concave cuts in trunk, do flush cuts as azaleas do not have thick callous material and don't roll well over ridges. If you work it into a SLIGHTLY larger pot and take out all the old soil and put in good bonsai soil, it should improve in vigor substantially . Make sure you fertilize with organic fertilizer as liquid chemical fert makes branches brittle. Down here in florida, we get all sorts of bugs and fungus. Neem oil seems to help most issues if applied regularly. You can do a saw cut partially though those big branches from the side, and in a year when that half has healed over, you can do another 50 % cutfor a total of 75% of branch cut. Then in a year you can saw off the rest of the branch and apply wound sealer to help keep cambium moist. Your biggest problem will be have wounds heal over before the open cuts start to rot or the cambium shrink back. If it pops a branch you are not sure you want, but it is just over or under a large wound, keep it to help heal wound. If the tree is already in a good bonsai mix and not pot bound you can start trimming hard now. If mix is starting to degrade and the roots are potbound, wait till that is fixed and tree is growing good before you do any big cuts. Like previous poster said , they do big cuts like that in Japan when trees are in ground and are very healthy and fertilized to recover fast from cutting insults. Pot bound azaleas that have been left for years in a pot are a beauty to behold, but can lead to disappointment if not prepped properly .
Jason
Just some thoughts on azaleas.

 

[berobinson82]

Thanks for all the recent replies, folks. The azalea is a Glen Dale Hybrid; more specifically a 'scout' azalea. I've got a lot to think about. My favorite nursery has a bunch more with nice big trunks. I'm going to be grabbing about 5 and starting the transformations. Will definitely follow up.

 

[lordy]

Two months + have elapsed since your last post on these azaleas. Have you any progress to tell? And we will need pics...of course.

 

[berobinson82]

Just saw this. They are both alive and well. Pushing lots of new growth towards the base as expected (?). I will grab some pictures as soon as I'm home today.

 

[berobinson82]

Haven't really done much with it but cut it back and now it's pushing buds everywhere. This is a late bloomer, btw so I expect to see more foliage pushed before the end of the summer. I'll let ya know.

B

 

[Victrinia Ridgeway]

B....

All azaleas have two major pushes a year... First in early spring to provide the tree energy to push blooms... second in late summer to get the tree to set the blooms for next year. Any pruning you do of the late summer foliage extension will remove flowers for next year. Flower buds are usually formed by October, and will sit and wait all through the winter. Don't let a developing azalea flower (which I am sure has already been mentioned)... so late in the summer I'd remove the tips of the new growth all together. That way you'll be sure all energy stored up will restrict itself to development next year. If you want to see a bloom, leave one branch unpruned and it should pop for you. Root work in combination with hard pruning will often stall flower production, as will insufficient light when they are setting their flower buds. With azaleas it's a process of growing out and cutting back. You can put movement in the branches with wiring... if the branch has any size to it, it can tend to be brittle... the best way to wire azalea when it's significant is to double wire but split the gap. I've got a developing azalea that I need to wire out, so when I get on that I'll put up some illustrative photos of what I mean. For the moment you just want to feed the stuffings out of it to promote growth... I would actually lower the far right sub-trunk in your image more if it were mine... but I think it's responding well to your care.

Kindest regards,

Victrinia

 

[berobinson82]

B....

All azaleas have two major pushes a year... First in early spring to provide the tree energy to push blooms... second in late summer to get the tree to set the blooms for next year. Any pruning you do of the late summer foliage extension will remove flowers for next year. Flower buds are usually formed by October, and will sit and wait all through the winter. Don't let a developing azalea flower (which I am sure has already been mentioned)... so late in the summer I'd remove the tips of the new growth all together. That way you'll be sure all energy stored up will restrict itself to development next year. If you want to see a bloom, leave one branch unpruned and it should pop for you. Root work in combination with hard pruning will often stall flower production, as will insufficient light when they are setting their flower buds. With azaleas it's a process of growing out and cutting back. You can put movement in the branches with wiring... if the branch has any size to it, it can tend to be brittle... the best way to wire azalea when it's significant is to double wire but split the gap. I've got a developing azalea that I need to wire out, so when I get on that I'll put up some illustrative photos of what I mean. For the moment you just want to feed the stuffings out of it to promote growth... I would actually lower the far right sub-trunk in your image more if it were mine... but I think it's responding well to your care.

Kindest regards,

Victrinia

I was derned glad to see your post! Thank you for the guidance and suggestions.

I agree that the right side is unbalanced. It's hard to tell from this 2D but the middle trunk moves away from the viewer severely. It's almost like a 3-fingered hand cupping a softball...(did that help?) At first I was going to cut the back trunk completely off and have a mother/daughter composition of the 2 outside trunks. Indecision got the best of me unfortunately. My gut says it's too tall regardless so I'll have to remedy that. Thank you for pointing that out. Is there any reason to let the lowest growing buds form into foliage if I'm not going to keep them around? The trunk is already fairly thick...


I look forward to your azalea post!

 

[Victrinia Ridgeway]

Honestly... There's actually very little I would keep of the sub-trunking. A mother daughter image would not be effective in this case unless you are growing the daughter from a sprig. None of the available sub-trunks have the right size differential to be a Mother/Daughter image. Plus, a Mother/Daughter is only effective if the daughter is coming from the basal flare itself. Once it's up above that it's a sub-trunk. So if you keep the sub-trunks, then you are going for a twin trunk style. Make sense?

I'm up to my eyes in work, but if you send me your email, I would be happy to send you some azalea information I put together for a lecture I gave last year. I think you'd find at least some of the information helpful... I'll also try and contribute more once I get home tonight. I could talk about azaleas until the cows come home.

Kindly,

Victrinia

 

[Victrinia Ridgeway]

Oh, and the answer regarding unwanted sprigs when you have trunk size you want is to taken them off... rub them off when they are just sprouting if you can so that you reduce the healing needed to cover over. And check for sprouts often... they come on like crazy when it's healthy.

V

 

[berobinson82]

Honestly... There's actually very little I would keep of the sub-trunking. A mother daughter image would not be effective in this case unless you are growing the daughter from a sprig. None of the available sub-trunks have the right size differential to be a Mother/Daughter image. Plus, a Mother/Daughter is only effective if the daughter is coming from the basal flare itself. Once it's up above that it's a sub-trunk. So if you keep the sub-trunks, then you are going for a twin trunk style. Make sense?

Kindly,

Victrinia

A twin trunk. Yes. I was unsure of what to call it. Thank you for the clarification. I'm not sure I understand what you meant by not keeping any of the sub-trunking. Once you're not as busy with work, would you help me understand?

With gratitude,

B

 

[tmmason10]

I agree with removing the subtrunks. I think it would make a killer sumo shohin with that base and flare. Not sure if now is the time or not but that is definitely an option.