Photo of it now

Side angle

Back

Uy, that plant has a very nice base, Christine.

If it was my plant, I will definitely prune it towards a more compact look (a matter of personal preference). I will also cut back a bit on the fertilizer (25% of the recommended strength, every weekly watering during the growth season) because I prefer slower, fatter growth as opposed to rapid, gangly growth that tends to bow down because of the weight of heavy leaves and blooms.

From the early photo, you look like you already have a plan for how you want the plant to look. You'll have a better idea where to cut. Remember, your plant has about 50-50 odds of developing multiple branches at that point. I whack off any branch that annoys me.

Are you somewhere warm? If you are you can do it now. I prune in the winter myself but only because I have one very warm, very sunny room indoors that I keep pretty humid.

Pagan

Christine,
The leaves are definitely 'large'. Whether it is due to high nitrogen levels &/or this plant has been under the Bonsai culture for some time? It would reduce the size of the leaves. I do not know the previous care of this plant.
As Pagan mentions, probably fertilizer.
You can prune your plant (being from Australia) in the spring and again after first flowering usually, as you have a long growing season.
If you keep the plant where it is with majority of sun on one side of plant. Then you may need to turn the plant every few days to have it grow even all around. Generally if in hot sun you would not turn to save the Caudex from becoming burnt.
Very healthy looking plant otherwise.
Rick

This post was edited by rcharles on Fri, Jan 23, 15 at 9:18

I live in the tropics in Australia so we don't get much winter. I'm watering it every 3 days and one weekend I water with weakened seasol and the second weekend i water with a flower booster. I bought this plant because of its bent shape, the the amount of branches and of course the caudex size. It just jumped out at me and said I'm the one.

No laughing at the newbie. I have given him a haircut. Now I've either overdone it or underdone it. Let me know if I get a pat on the back or need to go back and try again please.

And Rick, I read somewhere that I shouldn't turn the plants as the sun will burn the underside of the leaves, but now that u have explained it very simply for me and he has a haircut I will make sure to turn him regularly. Makes perfect sense when u say it. Thanks so much.

Christine, I would have trimmed exactly as you did, actually. Now that they can see the sky, the monks will be able to meditate better.

Very nice plant, yo.

Pagan

Haha u have given me the giggles now. Thanks so much, I have been worried I did it wrong. i think I stood there and walked around and around it for about 20 minutes before I did my first cut.

Christine,
It looks very good. I hated it when I pruned my first plant. It managed very well.
About the turning. Your climate and sun can be so intense from what I understand, especially now. If the plant is rotated regularly then the whole of the plane should be acclimated to the sun.
I do it particularly with mine, as in the spring I have mine in a sun room where they received sun only at half circle until summer. By doing this, I find that I get multiple branching from each pruned branch.
Then when out in the summer they receive sun at 360ð full circle and I do not rotate then.
Very nice plant and I love your pot.
I laughed when I pictured you circling your plant to get an idea as to where you where going to prune it. Something I do when planting a plant out in the yard.
Rick

Thanks Rick. I will definitely be rotating them all from now on. I did notice with my babies that they were all getting a lean on them so I did start rotating them a few weeks ago so they dont end up crooked.

I've also added a pic of some of my babies for your advice. I'm a bit concerned now that cause I've been over fertilising my others that I might be doing the same with the babies. I give them a low dose of thrive once every 2 weeks and water them every 3 days and they are growing fast but I'm now not sure if they are growing too fast. They are 2 months old. Some of them are still single stems but some have now got tiny branches popping up on the sides. I am also a bit excited that I might have a variegated one but I have heard that they can change back to green later on. Are the leaves a bit large on these too for their age?

A closer pic of the one I'm hoping will be variegated. It's the second one in the second row.

Your seedlings look great, Christine. The feeding schedule you describe also sounds alright, for your weather. As long as they get a lot of sun, they will tend to grow stout. Of course, there's always an errant obesum behaving every which way, regardless of what we do.

Pagan

Thanks Pagan. Good to know I'm on the right track.

This post was edited by Christine20 on Sat, Jan 24, 15 at 21:17