Collected Phillyrea

I need your advice for this... ugly root of a phillyrea which have been dug in March 2011 after my neighbour has made some cleaning in his land.

This is not even appropriate for "turtle's back" style
Nevertheless I can take this as a good learning material.

Since then, my "little helper" has accomplished a very good job on pruning the newly emerged shoots so that I was doubtful about her survival. But the phillyrea has proven to be very much resisting to Blofas' pruning.
So, this is in July, about 4 months since it has been collected


And this last one is on 20.04.2012

A little earlier I have removed a lot of shoots which are coming out from everywhere!

My question : Should I keep all the remaining shoots and keep on removing new ones that emerge?

Hi Alexandra,

I suggest you choose the branches you are going to use and remove the rest. (better keep more than what you might really need)
This way, the tree's energy will only flow towards the future branches.

Stavros, thank you very much for your response!

Very nice trunk!

Note that if you keep so many branches in same proximity, it will cause reverse taper later. Plan your branches now and only keep the ones you will potentially use and sacrificial branches (SB). I also pinch/prune them now and encourage branching so later, you already have the needed "movement" on your branches. Note that you have to visualize it as if it is already mature and thicker.

On the new branches, keep the sprouts closest to the main trunk as sacrificial branches to thicken your new (final) branch. The SB by the way will emerge as you pinch also.

Thank you, too, Dario!
Your and Stavros' suggestions are very clear.
I hope I will manage to keep the Phillyrea going OK and come back again to ask you advice for carving!

Good trunk that seems like an adenium trunk,
I would like to watch its development!

Thanks for sharing
Taner Tuncer