The Flamenco Dancers have seemingly forgiven me
for their repotting and like their new digs. Watering it is so much leas stressful with the media draining nicely now. New tiny buds seem to appear every time I look at it and impress me by coming out of more and more places, this lovely azalea just wont be denied its place in the world.
After my previous posts on the subject, i did cut that chunky stump on the right further down to flow better and get out of the way of vigorous growth tucked behind it. I assume the cut will end up hiding in the foliage within the year. I will wait a year at least before I commit to stripping any bark from that trunkline, many many reasons, not the least of which is simply to make sure its dead as a doornail in the section first.
While the inch or so I cut back was dry wood and brown inner bark layers (it had been previously chopped back last May), considerably further down the line, there is still some green in the bark (discovered that when I made a small scrape during repotting
)
I like the new streamline profile it takes and maybe someday I’ll take a fine grinder and carve it smoother.
(the green highlighter in the first photo was me marking the current extent of the back budding. On the longer branches, its a good inch lower down than last years growth