Azalea

[Ilithya]

Hello Everyone, Can I please ask everyone to help me what is the best thing to do with my Azalea?

Thank you



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[shibui]

Best thing to do will depend what you want out of it.
At the moment I see a tall, thin tree with very little taper and all the main branches coming from one spot on the trunk. The horizontal branches don't do much for me either but you have plenty of shoots below that to develop.

At this stage of its life you can still develop almost any shaped tree out of this stock. It is so young and undeveloped that it does not have a defined shape or style. You can make whatever you like from this material.

My ideal azalea would have a powerful thick trunk with graceful curves and movement, well established branches and plenty of ramification to carry the flowers and show them properly. Try to find some pictures of azaleas in Japanese shows. to see what I mean. Unfortunately azaleas are reasonably slow to develop and it will take 30 years to grow a tree like that. Are you prepared to put that time in? To achieve that you'll need to wire some curves into the trunk then plant it in the garden for 20 years then dig it and start developing the branches.

We do see some azaleas in spring shows here that don't have the powerful trunk or great branches but because they are covered in flowers they are quite eye catching. They still tend to have curved trunks but not always so thick so maybe wire the trunk and bend it a bit. Probably remove at least one of those branches from the set of 3 midway up then see what it looks like. After that, plenty of trimming the fresh shoots to build up ramification and plenty of small shoots to carry flowers and

Another option would be to trunk chop above the first branch and start to grow the structure from the start but I suppose you don't want to hear that either.

[Ilithya]

Best thing to do will depend what you want out of it.
At the moment I see a tall, thin tree with very little taper and all the main branches coming from one spot on the trunk. The horizontal branches don't do much for me either but you have plenty of shoots below that to develop.

At this stage of its life you can still develop almost any shaped tree out of this stock. It is so young and undeveloped that it does not have a defined shape or style. You can make whatever you like from this material.

My ideal azalea would have a powerful thick trunk with graceful curves and movement, well established branches and plenty of ramification to carry the flowers and show them properly. Try to find some pictures of azaleas in Japanese shows. to see what I mean. Unfortunately azaleas are reasonably slow to develop and it will take 30 years to grow a tree like that. Are you prepared to put that time in? To achieve that you'll need to wire some curves into the trunk then plant it in the garden for 20 years then dig it and start developing the branches.

We do see some azaleas in spring shows here that don't have the powerful trunk or great branches but because they are covered in flowers they are quite eye catching. They still tend to have curved trunks but not always so thick so maybe wire the trunk and bend it a bit. Probably remove at least one of those branches from the set of 3 midway up then see what it looks like. After that, plenty of trimming the fresh shoots to build up ramification and plenty of small shoots to carry flowers and

Another option would be to trunk chop above the first branch and start to grow the structure from the start but I suppose you don't want to hear that either.

Thank you Shibui. I been looking for this post and having hard time to find it. im thinking to chop the truck and leave the new shoot on the lower truck and leave it for couple of years to grow.

Thank you
Ilithya

[kcpoole]

Cut back hard to one of the exiting low shoots and regrow creating taper and movemet as you go, Wire beofr ethe shoots harden off and you can get tight bends, Later on they will not bend at all.
fertilise well and let it grow on and chop each year to build the trunk.

Ken

[Ilithya]

Cut back hard to one of the exiting low shoots and regrow creating taper and movemet as you go, Wire beofr ethe shoots harden off and you can get tight bends, Later on they will not bend at all.
fertilise well and let it grow on and chop each year to build the trunk.

Ken

Thanks ken. ill take your advice. ill leave it to grow for couple of years.

Thank you
Ilithya