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Articles Most Recent Articles My Satsuki Azaleas | My Satsuki Azaleas |
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| Written by Fred Nowak | |
| Wednesday, 22 June 2011 | |
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This year, I permitted my Satsuki Azalea to flower. No, not all the flower buds were permitted to progress into white, red and multicolor blooms. A great number of buds were removed before they ever opened to preserve the tree’s strength and energy. A number of photos were taken but only one is shown…..(continued) After the blooms, the flowers and seed pods were removed. The tree was taken to the May meeting of the Memphis Bonsai Society where the process of  leaf removal and Motobadome took place. Motobadome is a technique of leaf tip/bud trimming that was taught and demonstrated by David our Kreutz at a Bonsai Society meeting a number of years ago. Removing the foliage really opened up the inner branches and trunk to the sunlight that, by the way, in yard is from mid morning to early afternoon. Otherwise the Satsuki enjoys shade and protection from the hot afternoon sun. This opening will hopefully permit advantageous buds deeper into the tree to bud out and grow branches. This is exactly what I want since the canopy of the tree was getting too large and needed to be pruned back to make a more compact tree. A photo of the “denuded” tree is shown. One can see that the tree is opened up with few and small clipped leaves permitting light to get to the inner branches. I was reasonably pleased with the preparation of the tree for back-budding …BUT there are now concerns. From notes taken when David Kreutz made a presentation on Satsukis and also from his handouts, he had indicated that the Satsuki azalea will go dormant in temperatures over 90 degrees. We have experienced extremely hot weather very early this year. In fact, we have had record tying and record setting temperatures in the mid to upper 90’s and they are expected to stay in the low to mid 90’s for an extended period of time. As a result, I have questions. How will the extreme temperatures affect my foliage-stripped Satsuki. Will there be any back-budding if the tree in fact goes dormant? If so, will the new branchlets grow so I can reduce the canopy and get the desired compaction of the tree? Don’t know the answers but will pay special attention to the tree (and my other Satsukis which had the same technique applied) to see what may happen and continue to give them tender loving care. When the answer comes, I’ll let you know. |
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