SU2
Omono
I'd say that's a LONG time for a re-pot, at least if it's not in a container like a pond-basket/colander, can just picture the thick, circling roots! At least they can handle massive root-prunings like champs! However, w/ you not being able to water frequently, you can still have 'the best of both worlds' by simply using an epiphytic mix (like "orchid mix" products that are bark, peat etc), you can have drainage *and* high water-retention (in fact you could even add those water-absorbing polymer crystals into the substrate, the ones that swell-up like 8X their original size when wet, they are just awesome not only for the water retention&release but soil-structure since they move the substrate every time they enlarge/contract, this is something that worms/etc would do naturally but don't in our containers!)For substrate: I made a few less-than-ideal choices since I got the plant 18 months ago, and got to the point where either I was going to kill it mucking about, or I was going to make certain that it survived by reverting to a natural substrate. The potting soil and sheep shit has worked really well and the plant is doing quite well now (health wise). I intend on leaving the roots alone for 2-3 years to develop a thick root-pad before deciding on any other substrate change.
(and I've gotta ask, why on earth are you now "random user" instead of SKbonsai? am confuse ;p )
I think this IS the ticket, will explain in a sec!Flowering: I found that clipping the bracts and flowers as soon as they began to show colour, did have "some effect" on encouraging veg but not enough to employ as a way to prevent flowering.
You can make that decision by gaging the tree ie is it healthy/established or not? I've had cuttings that I just rooted start to flower, surely they are what we'd consider 'death flowering' (trying to re-produce because it seems death is imminent....when the health/vigor of a tree is low enough sometimes it'll just go to flower instead of trying to grow) But, as you said you tended to think, they do basically just flower when they're healthy, they can flower many times in a year with flowering sessions taking 6+ weeks...it's funny because I've got two that are blooming like crazy right now and they're two of my weakest, for example here's one that wasn't healthy and did a full-on flowering, I let it go so it could 'stabilize' a bit but just removed the flowers today:I am undecided if the plant is trying to flower because it thinks its going to die (and wants to throw its seed before this happens), or if they just flower when they have available resources (I tend to think the latter in the case of bougs).
I've got others that are weak & flowering, but most of my bougies are healthy and now barely putting out flowers (they were weeks ago but those were clipped and never re-appeared), when they do I'm simply clipping them when they're visible....which leads to the prior quote:
It does have that effect, almost a month ago I was shown pics on another forum that were similar to @Starfox 's pics here, showing me that tip-growth will resume after flowering (they went further and expressly said they just remove the flowers and it keeps growing), I setup a handful of 'tester branches' and put tags on them to ID and removed their developing flowers, they just continued to grow and, in weeks, have yet to try putting out new flowers (ie I don't think it was just some 'delaying flowering' I think it legitimately got its flowers out and moved on), one of these tester branches grew 25% in a little over a week (grew from 20" to 25" in 8 or 9 days after it was tagged+de-flowered, was this healthy/vigorous guy:did have "some effect" on encouraging veg but not enough to employ as a way to prevent flowering
[lol you can see the blue 'tag' in the center of the canopy, that's the branch that was de-flowered and went from 20" to 25" in barely over a week after I clipped its half-formed flower bracts! Also worth mentioning the two flowering bougies to either side of the central boxed one, those are two of my weakest potted bougies, the one to the right is literally a stump I laid against a piece of a broken mortar pot and used screen&zip-tie to hold some DE over it, it's been close to a year now and it's still alive somehow lol, there's less about as much substrate-volume as trunk-volume on that lil guy, he flowers a lot and I suspect it's nothing more than "I'm dying / must propagate myself!" responses!]
Can you re-post the tree by chance? Am unsure what you mean by 'getting the veg stage straightened away', and I dispute your notion that "it won't ever have good branch-structure", I've found bougainvillleas to have an absurdly flexible morphology, you'd said a couple pages ago:My intentions: The trunk on this plant is 3-3.5" across (depending on the viewing angle) and about 6-8" high. Will make a good formal upright, if I can get the veg stage straightened away. However, I now realize that it won't ever have good branch structure, so the best I can do is fill in the canopy with vegetative growth to have a fuller looking appearance... the plant is on track to do this now.
this got me thinking the same as you, that I'm going to make some upright formals myself (though I haven't seen it said you can't..), anyways for example check out this cutting (probably 2/3 of my bougies are propagated hardwood cuttings that were started like this guy), after letting the first shoots grow a bit they're simply zip-tied at their bases so that the branch-collars are angled upward and, once they start really growing and tapering-into the trunk, this early angling intervention will make all the difference, I'll have my primary branches set&lignified in a way to allow me to do a proper upright:I want to have the only upright formal boug since it seems to be generally accepted (on web sites that I've read) that they won't conform to this style.
...btw that's my idea of 'slip potting' lol....I probably get 85-90% success doing this type of propagation and use styro/plastic cups to start, once there's enough escape-roots I'm setting them into slightly larger containers that have real rich[but well-draining!] substrates so that they can successfully finish their first growth-spurt and hit the stage where I can comfortably prune the top & bottom, re-potting at the same time
But so far as branch manipulation you can really push them where&how you want to, I'm expecting the right-side shoot on this branch to 'fuse'/grow-into/taper-from the trunk very well:
(that's a limb being re-built because it was too-tall for this guy: , so it's great to be able to easily guide it where it needs to grow!)
And expecting these branches to fuse together (was going to remove one but why waste? ) by mid/late summer as well:
Actually that^ is going to get the 'regular branches' approach as well, will be removing the top-half (everything above my 2 branches/leaders) at some point down the road (once I have a better root-mass), I know it's too-thick to be 'formal upright' and I suck at the nomenclature but this will be developed like a (very thick/stout!) 'regular tree' in that it'll be a straight trunk leading to 2 vertical primaries leading to a rounded canopy, will take til the end of next growing-season I expect but by then I should have a neat little specimen! This was a 'cutting' lol, a 1' tall / 5" wide stump that I put 4" into perlite, took 6wks but it rooted!
Same here! That's all we can do, learn what we can and then apply it to the best of our abilities Though I'd disagree w/ leo on this one, I've found bougainvilleas to be virtually carefree when it comes to re-potting, the sole problem/concern is that the root//trunk intersection must be treated carefully if the roots aren't thoroughly developed (for instance on my propagated stuff, the roots themselves are very hardy but their attachment to the trunk, not so strong!)(I think it was Leo in Illinois who said to leave the roots alone for a couple of years after the first repotting.) I want those people to know that their advice wasn't ignored outright. No matter what anyone says, I do give it consideration, but I did what I thought to be the best course, at that moment in time, with the experience that I've gained with other plants, and the resources that are available to me...
"If I were you"; I'd leave one of those cuttings to do whatever it wanted to do and see what the results are. You are fortunate to be in the best place (possibly) in the continental U.S. for this plant's natural growth habit, so I'd take advantage of that. "In my mind" just the term "vine" conjures thoughts of something that grows helter-skelter... you can't push a rope or herd bumble bees, so letting it do what it wants "might get you something worthwhile", but continually messing with it/them, might ensure that you're never satisfied with it on any level.
I've got sooo many bougies as I propagate them constantly, I've got in-ground ones that I leave to their own devices and I've got propagates I'm forcing into certain parameters- they really are that flexible in their growth habits to allow for this, they can be guided to most any form so I'd definitely drop the notion of them being unchanging and 'set in their way' as you're implying here! And yes my area is certainly among the best in the US for growing them outdoors, you're inside though so you can do whatever conditions you choose right? If growing well they can be pushed to most-anything!