Bougainvillea only blooming on one branch? Learn this one trick for a tree full of gorgeous blooms

Bougainvillea is a type of paperflower with a distinctive leaf shape. It has a long blooming period and easily fills out its pot, making it relatively easy to grow into a tree covered in flowers. However, Xiaohua received a message from a fellow gardening enthusiast saying that their bougainvillea only had one branch blooming, while the others were just decoration. They really could not understand why, with the same "food" and the same care, the other branches would not bloom. The enthusiast said it looked both funny and puzzling. Why exactly does this happen?

This is mainly because the enthusiast did not prune in time and did not control watering, causing the branches to grow leggy. If your bougainvillea branches are not pruned for a long time and are allowed to grow freely, this situation is likely to occur.

When pruning, you must be willing to cut back; only with sacrifice comes reward

Generally, bougainvillea will undergo one heavy pruning during its care. What is heavy pruning? It is a pruning done to give the bougainvillea a good plant shape. Usually, after buying a bougainvillea, if the enthusiast is not satisfied with its shape, they do a major trim. You can cut away all the excess branches according to the shape you like. Some enthusiasts keep only a few main branches, and even the main branches are pruned back significantly. Heavy pruning looks very thorough.

After one heavy pruning, generally no further heavy pruning is needed, but three prunings per year are still necessary. However, what Xiaohua wants to say is that bougainvillea is not afraid of heavy pruning. For example, Xiaohua once had two pots of bougainvillea: one was lightly pruned, and one was heavily pruned. As a result, the lightly pruned one did not produce vigorous new shoots, while the heavily pruned one sent out far more branches than the lightly pruned one, and the new branches were very thick and grew vigorously. So bougainvillea is not afraid of pruning; the harder you cut, the more vigorously it grows.

1. Prune once around Qingming

The first pruning of the year should be done around Qingming. Although this one is lighter than heavy pruning, it should still be somewhat severe. Cut away all the numerous branches and shorten them a bit. In this way, strong new branches will sprout after 20 days. After more than a month, once the branches have grown longer, you can carry out the second pruning.

2. Give it a little buzz cut

This is done roughly from late June to early July. The principle of pruning is to cut all branches evenly, just like giving a buzz cut. This is to encourage the bougainvillea to produce more new branches, so that it can bloom more abundantly.

3. Give it another buzz cut

The third pruning is in August, no later than mid-August. July and August have high temperatures and plenty of rain, which is a good period for growing plant vigor. During the branch-growing period, apply sufficient fertilizer to promote healthy branch growth. If too much fertilizer causes leggy branches, they must be cut off, and overly long branches should also be shortened, with the goal of not damaging the branch structure. Remember that after the Start of Autumn, daylight becomes shorter and the plant enters the natural stage of flower bud differentiation in the leaf axils at the branch tips, so pause pruning, otherwise there will be no flowers to enjoy!!

Fellow gardening enthusiasts, have you learned it? Now let's talk about water control for bougainvillea.

To make paperflower bloom uniformly and abundantly, water control must be carried out before flowering. Starting in September, control watering of the paperflower. Each watering should wait until the potting soil is dry and the branches and leaves are soft and drooping. Repeat this continuously for half a month, then after half a month resume normal watering. During the water control period, absolutely do not fertilize, to avoid fertilizer burning the roots. In about one month this way, the paperflower will show buds and bloom, and the flowers will open uniformly and profusely.

Now let's talk about sunlight and fertilizing for bougainvillea.

1. Fertilizing

Bougainvillea likes fertilizer. After the weather warms up in spring, apply nitrogen fertilizer once every 10 to 15 days. During the growing period, apply cake fertilizer water once a week, and increase phosphorus fertilizer several times during the flowering period.

It should be noted that bougainvillea is very sensitive to urea. Improper fertilization may lead to lush branches and leaves but few flowers, so be especially cautious when applying urea. In summer, apply some liquid fertilizer lightly. If conditions permit, use a 0.2% to 0.3% potassium dihydrogen phosphate solution as a foliar top dressing, once every half month. In the early stage of flower branch growth, apply urea once to promote flower branch growth.

2. Sunlight

It likes high temperatures and relatively strong light, so place it in an area with plenty of sunlight to help it grow better. Grown this way, the branch nodes will be shorter, the number of flowers will be greater, the color will be deeper, and the flowering time will last longer. For potted plants at home, place them in a sunny spot for care.