So I just picked up my 3rd tree but perhaps my first workable one, so I'm here for advice on what you guys think should be done, was planning on keeping it in the plastic for the next year as I'm in Australia so we are now heading into our last month of spring, and repotting next year, does anyone believe I should defoliate and perhaps wire some branches? All help greatly appreciated !

Nice material you have found!

I never work on my trees the first year. Step one is to get to know the tree and make it absoluttely top healthy. Meantime I study the tree from all angles trying to see where the tree wants to be in the future.

Defoliating a tree weakens it and are a risk to the tree, normally something done on allready developed trees preparing them for a show. In development you need streangth and health, not weak by defoliation.

Yes perhaps your correct, is hard to be patient enough to not go trigger happy on such a nice tree, as u can tell my first field grown tree with a considerable trunk, do you believe i should just keep up on some regular light trimming or should i just let it grow wild and start work in the next spring

That looks lovely! But care with it, Numerous species of plants belong to the genus Ficus and contain irritating sap.

Looks hapy enough. If you get a good spring flush, I would not be concerned with trimming / wiring early summer. IF you defoliate, with ficus you should also remove the end-buds so the whole branch starts sprouting side-branches.

Usually, in doing it you force the tree to grow new leaves, leading to a reduction in the size of leaves and an increase in ramification. This technique should only be used on deciduous trees healthy enough to withstand this demanding technique.