Need Some Advice How Best to Cut, Replant

My Aztec Gold is growing well but into an odd shape. Goal is to have a large, structurally sound mass of AG flowers in the one spot.

The trunk leans 45 degrees to the east coming out of the ground, to a Y.

One large branch off that trunk has about 24" of greyish, leathery portion, heading further east, then rebranches into three, nice-looking, fresh green branches.

Another smaller branch off the main trunk is green and heads south, with about 12" of a less leathery but still grey-silver part.

I am tempted to cut the larger "trident" and root it as one large cutting, set as close to the main trunk as would be prudent. Later --or concurrently unless it'd be unwise to do both these steps at once-- I envision cutting the single branch and re-rooting that as well, also right close by.

Would one or more readers kindly take a moment to look at the photos I am posting, and offer expert advice? I would be most obliged --thanks.

First shot (looking north) shows mainly the trident. It is about 5' long, from the tip of the middle branch to the fork of the Y at the main trunk.

This message was edited Jan 5, 2008 10:48 PM

Second shot shows the single branch, and a little better view of the Y.

Should I cut both at once, or one at a time?

Where should I cut each one, to ensure I get further branching off the trimmed-back Y as well as at least two healthy new plants?

What minimum distance from the main trunk, left in place, should I replant such cuttings?

I sit at your feet, an eager student...

Hi JP, I'm no expert, but I would not cut them both at the same time as you may rob yourself of flowers for one season from this plant. I'm not sure when the growing season starts for you if it ever even ends, but I would wait until the start of the growing season and do the tallest one first. That will give your shorter greener one time to put on a bit more growth so that you can root the cutting that you cut.

You always want to have a few nodes left from the trunk so that new branches can sprout. Count and make sure before you cut that you have several nodes left on the cut piece. If you cut too close to the trunk, the remaining portion may die back to the main stem. If you do want to eliminate the lower branch altogether, then you can cut it off at its base at the trunk. It just depends upon what look you are going for.

For the fullest plant possible, I would trim like this if I were going to trim, but be sure that there are nodes left before you cut. I would make sure that the cuttings are going to be at least 8-12 inches so that you won't have trouble rooting them.

Here's your other pic. I can't see the stem, but I put it across the leaf where the stem should be.

To answer your last question, I would plant at least six feet apart.

Thanks, Clare --I'm glad to get such an expert response.

The fear I have is that cutting each of the three points on the trident will leave a rather awkward, even fragile, plant structure --that is, a too-horizontal, too-long major branch off of a good sized but too-tilted main trunk. Cutting the whole trident, closer to the main trunk (but as you've advised leaving as many nodes as possible), has seemed to me a workable way to get the plant to grow into a more "defensible" shape. Am I wrong thinking that the heavy lean is something to try and correct?

Your six feet apart advice is way farther than I had in mind, but want to understand it. I had in mind really clustering the pieces of this Aztec Gold fairly close, for a denser overall planting --I was thinking more like about 12" -18". (Karen and I don't particularly like the sparse-bare-naked look some plumerias end up with...) Is this specifically too close for long term plant health and prosperity? Is your advice to keep them 6' apart an aesthetic consideration, or related more to plant health?

I am filing your pictures away carefully, and do plan to make all the cuts you've shown, staged over several months --just thinking maybe it should be in three, not two steps: 1. lop off the whole trident, get it rooting; 2.) later, lop off the single branch, get it rooting, finally 3.) lop off each of the trident prongs and get them going.

Thank you so much, Professor Clare.

JP, You can certainly cut lower and see what happens and follow your three-step plan. The other option or in addition to pruning, you can stake and straighten your plumeria, which would be a rather easy thing to do. You would be surprised how much a plumeria can bend without breaking. You would just drive a plastic or bamboo stake down near the trunk and pull back on the plumeria and tie with green plastic stretchy tape on the bottom, middle, and top. In a week or two, you would tighten the top part even tighter and repeat the process until it is totally straight. In a few weeks, the stake will no longer be needed, and you will have a straight plumeria. Some plumerias are naturally thin-branched and may require a permanent stake. Some end up getting top heavy and need a permanent stake too. For a fuller plumeria though, you would want to keep pruning as many branches as come in in order to get more branches. For example, if you prune those top three, you will likely get six more in their place as two or more will spring up from each cut.

Plumerias, as they grow, if not pruned, can grow wide and tall, and I think 6-10 feet is generally recommended so as not to grow into each other, but I could be wrong about that. If you picture a trunk or main stem and then go out three feet in each direction, that tree would be six feet across, and then those branches will branch again add a few more feet, and so on. The root systems can grow wide as well as the canopies.

I have some group plantings saved on my computer that I can show you, but I don't know who took all of the pictures in order to give credit to them.

Here is one from Kaz, taken in Hawaii:

I think these three trees are in Hawaii too:

I think this is one tree taken by Chris in Australia:

I think this one is Daryl's in Australia. They look like they are just maybe three feet apart.

Here's another one of Daryl's in Australia. Talk about a lovely jungle.

Last one, this in Australia also. People tend to forget that these are actually trees that can reach 30 feet tall and wide or more.

Check out this link: http://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/oc/freepubs/pdf/OF-31.pdf for a great article. It points out what commercial growers do for maximum branching under Culture.

JP - do you know why the tree grew that way to begin with?

Clare, some of those trees are inspirational.

Tucson's question is a good one --this specimen had an odd shape when I bought it, and has endured some accidental abuse in its youth. Also has had more total sun exposure on the side to which it currrently leans, but that is because of some banana trees to the west which I am going to eliminate --weeds which have served an initial purpose, but whose days are now numbered.

I am going to try a staking strategy, and change the cutting plan to take off the single branch first, re-root it in a large irrigated pot for now.

Sure, you can experiment with pruning and planting and see how it goes. Even if you do end up planting close together, you can always prune if they start growing into one another. I think Aztec Gold in particular likes to sprawl from what I've heard, but there might be two Aztec Golds in circulation -- one that likes to sprawl and one upright one, or perhaps there is only one, and AG just sprawls under certain growing conditions. Lack of light will make a plumie lean for sure. Good luck and let us know how it goes!

Clare,

OK, back in February, I went ahead and followed part of your advice, to make the first cut on the left (referring to you Jan 6 post above), applied rooting hormone and replanted the cutting about 3 feet away. Went about 9"deep into the ground, in an irrrigated spot.

Went back 60 days later --just got home-- and found the main plant MUCH bigger, the cutting doing great, the one stem I cut off about to branch, and two of the uncut branches flowering magnificently.

Some pics to elicit any further thoughts and advice you may have. With the test having gone so well, I plan to make all the cuts you recommended, to create two or three more cuttings and large new plants.

First the blooms...

This message was edited Apr 22, 2008 8:24 PM

This one shows the whole plant, with the trident branch in the back shown here missing its left "tine".

This one shows the new plant, which went in with all its leaves, dropped them, regree the two it now has --it's strongly rooted, looks very good, and has lots of luscious-looking growth on the tip, maybe about to flower.

Here's the cut branch, with a promising bulge on the left, and another smaller one in the back...I should probably trim up the dark part on the very end

Here's the other flower --I'm in awe.

The third trident tine --is this inflorescence, or more leaves?

Back to the first branch, with the largest bunch of flowers, note there are three more branches --same as on the other flowering branch-- are these inflo's or more vegetative growth?

Thanks for any thoughts, advice, observations...

Good job, JP! In that last picure, those are branches that come in surrounding the inflo. Plumerias usually only branch when they are cut or when they flower.

Your flowers are very beautiful.

I only see leaves in the picture of the third trident line, but it could still bloom for you. When a plumeria flowers, not all of its branches will flower at the same time; some just put on growth.

About the cutting, you should always remove all the leaves except for the top ones so the cutting doesn't expend energy trying to keep those leaves going. The leaves will also release moisture from the cutting, which we do not want when a cutting has no roots. You want the energy directed to rooting. Also, nine inches is very deep to plant a cutting. The usual deepness is 2-3 inches. It probably isn't fully rooted yet so you could dig it up and replant it if you want a taller tree.

I'm attaching a picture of where I think you might cut next. You could start with the cuts indicated by the yellow line since you don't have flowers on those branches, but you may want to wait on the red line now that it is flowering so you don't lose some flowers by cutting the branch. I think this will eventually give you a much fuller plant, and you'll have new cuttings to plant also.

One other note: your branches do look very green yet so you could wait until the wood hardens a bit and the branches become thicker. You could cut as late as mid- to late-summer in your climate. HTH

I have a aztec gold that grew weird I was going to cut it but Clare talked me out of it. I staked the branches and made it straighten up the best I could. Right now it has 8 inflos on it.

Messed up on the picture here it is

Great job!

Thanks for the great advice