Hello everyone and thank you in advance for taking the time to consider my question. I am new to Bonsai. I have been into the game about 6 months and have 3 plants so far. Although I have read books and done a considerable amount of online research I cannot find help for my situation.

This is my first tree and I got it at Christmas time last year. This Fukien tea tree was ordered online and got cold during the shipment to Kentucky. When I received it all of the leaves had fallen off and it looked dead. I sent pictures of the tree to the company and they sent me a new tree this spring, even though they told me that with enough care it might recover. I placed the tree in a terrarium under a grow lamp and it didnt take long to know that it had not died. It surely enough started to sprout new branches and a couple of the inner branches started to grow leaves again. after about 2 months I pruned all but maybe one or two dead branches, I left one in particular because I kind of like it. 6-months later it has all of these new branches. I have had a guide wires on it for a while to try to guide the branches toward making "pads". I have fairly recently moved the tree outside and it seems to be doing very well.

The new branches are getting very long. And my question is should I prune them down to size now? I'm afraid if I do they will not grow any thicker, as of now they are pretty thin. I wish that if I were to cut them that they would fork out and become more bushy. Possibly start to grow secondary branches. Should I wait until the new branches get close to the thickness I desire before cutting them? My original plan was to allow the tree just to grow freely all summer and consider pruning it in the fall, but now I think I might be hindering its current potential. Also, is it already to late in the growing season for that major of a pruning?

Thank you for any advice you can provide.

Here is a picture of my tree.

I have had one of these for 2 years, if it were mine I would prune back a good bit to try to encourage better ramification. As regards growing season, they don't really have one and pruning/repotting can be done anytime. Mine produces a load of new shoots during our summer months, these can be rooted quite easily if you want more trees. If you don't already know, they will not tolerate temps below about 50F and if kept indoors as mine is then as much light and humidity as possible is needed

Dave

hello there,
i have not got a fukien tea, but to help you with the pruning question, read the next sentence. what i do with my bonsai (chinese elm) is prune the shoots while they are quite thin and they fork. i think you should prune them now, and when they fork, pinch the growing tips and that will hopefully encourage back-budding, then the shoot will thicken. i hope the info posted was helpfull.

good luck,

jaimin

Thank you for your help. I went ahead and pruned my tree. I really like how it looks now and as it grows it should look even better. I think I just needed to hear that pruning it was a good idea from someone who knows what they are talking about. I did keep my cuttings too. I ended up with seven good-looking cuttings. I also used some more thread on my tree. The branches are just so thin and new I don't think I could use wire. Check it out.


Thanks again for all your help.

That's a bit better. The branch on bottom right is dead and needs to be removed. There are also some straggly bits that are doing nothing and need removing. The top is too dense and needs thinning out.

How did you make sure it stayed alive after it was shipped to you? Same exact thing happened to me this past Christmas!