Umbrella tree - how to promote branching?

rank78

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Two years ago I chopped off the branches of my Umbrella bonsai and planted them. They are doing well but are not branching. The mother plant had some branching after cutting but not as much as I expected. Is there other methods to branch besides chopping the top? Included are pics of the clones with yellow circles around where I cut off a few leaves at the top of the stem as I read this works for some trees. I wasn't really expecting that to work on these but those leaves had to go anyway.

Any advice appreciated.
 

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Bnana

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You chopped petioles not stems. Petioles never branche. This is not a very suitable species for bonsai as the leaders are very big with long petioles.
 

Forsoothe!

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You need to chop lower than any existing leaves. One leaf is the petiole with ~5 leaflets at the end.
 

Shibui

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The only way I know to get branching is to prune. The further back I prune the better response I get. New buds will grow from places where leaves are or once were.
The others have already pointed out that you have not actually cut the stem of the tree, just taken the ends of some leaves. To force branching you will need to cut the branch or trunk.
 

rank78

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From the responses it sounds like chopping the trunks of these clones are the only way to get them to branch. Was hoping there was another option. I think I'll do that to the bigger of the three and the other with a long trunk. Do I need them to have a least a few leaves to draw energy or will a bare chopped trunk still regrow branches and flourish? The mother plant had 5 branches and I kept one to retain leaves for recovery.
 

Kubruceiii

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Two years ago I chopped off the branches of my Umbrella bonsai and planted them. They are doing well but are not branching. The mother plant had some branching after cutting but not as much as I expected. Is there other methods to branch besides chopping the top? Included are pics of the clones with yellow circles around where I cut off a few leaves at the top of the stem as I read this works for some trees. I wasn't really expecting that to work on these but those leaves had to go anyway.

Any advice appreciated.
I'll be honest, I'm struggling to even grasp how you cutting a leaf and sticking it in dirt could even grow... do you have pictures? The part that you cut shouldn't have any meristematic tissue and therefore shouldn't have been able to generate a new tree. Are you saying that the pictures you just posted are from two years ago?

I'll be following this thread as I like the plant. I had one last summer but a storm blew it off the porch railing and trashed it, so I trashed it. 🤷‍♂️
 

Kubruceiii

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Okay, nevermind, I re-read and I get it now. The pictures you posted were taken today, and are of the clones you made from your mother plant a few years ago, and you trimmed the leaves recently to try and promote branching on the clones.

I removed some leaves from the umbrella I used to have last summer as they were damaged in a fall before the one that killed it (I should have known and fixed the instability issue) - no new branches appeared then, just new leaves above the ones I cut off. As has been said, to promote branching you need to cut the stem, not leaves, just like you did when you made the clones. This works for any most species, bonsai or otherwise. It is also a technique used with cannabis and is known as "topping" in that community. Good luck, I'll still be following this post to see how you fare.
 

wrongdog

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Just cut the main stem (trunk) about a quarter of the way down from the top (leave 3/4 of the plant) and it will possibly branch. I have several of these and they come back from cutting fine, but they don't always branch. I take ALL the leaves off in Feb of each year and cut them back - I see branching about 50% of the time. You don't have to leave any foliage as long as the roots are well established and it can draw energy from them.

Attaching images of one of these operations - taken about 2 months apart - you can see that they were small but regained their vigor no problem.
 

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Shibui

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From the responses it sounds like chopping the trunks of these clones are the only way to get them to branch. Was hoping there was another option. I think I'll do that to the bigger of the three and the other with a long trunk. Do I need them to have a least a few leaves to draw energy or will a bare chopped trunk still regrow branches and flourish? The mother plant had 5 branches and I kept one to retain leaves for recovery.
I am not aware of any other option to get branching but pruning is quite effective over time. Just keep chopping as they grow.
There is no need to have leaves on umbrella tree. They can grow back from almost anything so you can cut really hard and take every leaf and every branch off and it will still grow new shoots.
as mentioned, just nipping out the tip often just produces one new shoot so no gain to branching but cutting more off, even back to the brown will usually give a number of new shoots coming from dormant buds at old leaf axils even if the leaves have been gone for many years. growing tips produce hormones that suppress new shoots so leaving a growing tip on will often reduce the number of new shoots that emerge.

There's a limit to how many branches a small umbrella can have but, in general, cut ruthlessly for better branching.
 

Tums

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It's also more likely that they'll branch after a cut if they're getting strong light and have a lot of energy.
 

rank78

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Thanks for all the feedback guys! I'll try to do some chopping and defoliating this week and take some pics, then follow up with progress shots. I didn't include any pics of the mother plant because you can't see branches easily with the oversized leaves but I'll include one from pre-chop 2 years ago to show how it's branches changed.
 

Bonsai Nut

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In the spring, cut it back hard to fibrous "woody" growth (despite the name it is a plant and not a tree). Eliminate all leggy stems. Defoliate completely.

It will back-bud even on old sections of branch and trunk. The first push of growth will be shorter, and the compound leaves will be smaller, than if you had let it bud out from the prior years' growth. Though they can tolerate direct sun, I found mine did best in bright indirect lighting.
 

sorce

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How'd I miss you.... you're from round here!

Welcome to Crazy!

Sorce
 
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