How to grow the trunk of a bougainvillea thick

Bougainvillea is a flowering plant with large blooms and brilliant colors, very suitable for growing as a home potted plant. But if we can grow its trunk thick and train it into a tree-stump bonsai, it will certainly greatly enhance the ornamental effect. As everyone knows, flowering evergreen tree-stump bonsai generally can be enjoyed not only for their flowers, but are also suitable for viewing their foliage and their form. So, how do you grow a thick trunk on a bougainvillea?

In fact, growing the trunk of a bougainvillea thick comes down to focusing on two aspects of management during normal care: pruning and fertilizing. Pruning can not only control the plant's shape and design its form, but also stimulate the plant's sprouting and the growth of its branches and trunk. And if the plant is to maintain vigorous growth, its demand for nutrients will also increase, so fertilizing is also very important. Therefore, in order to grow the bougainvillea's trunk thick, we may as well focus our efforts on the two aspects of pruning and fertilizing.

1. Prune in time

Pruning is an important means of controlling the plant's shape and form, and it is also an indispensable measure for thickening the plant's trunk. Since plants all have apical dominance, and bougainvillea is no exception, and since bougainvillea has strong sprouting ability and is also very tolerant of pruning, timely tip control can both control the plant's shape and create conditions for growing a thick trunk. After all, once the bougainvillea loses its apical dominance, the growth points will be dispersed in all directions, and nutrients will also flow back to the trunk to a certain extent, especially accumulating nutrients at the base of the trunk.

Of course, a bougainvillea that has lost its apical dominance will also sprout quite a few side branches due to the stimulation of pruning, and as the side branches keep growing, each side branch will gradually become a new main branch, thereby continuing to maintain apical dominance. So eliminating the bougainvillea's growth dominance is not limited to the trunk; you also need to pinch or cut back the many newly formed branches that have growth dominance. In this way, the plant will continuously accumulate nutrients at the base of the trunk and continuously sprout new branches and leaves, so in the end the bougainvillea's trunk will thicken, and at the same time you can control the plant's shape and keep it lush with branches and leaves.

2. Fertilize sufficiently

To grow the bougainvillea's trunk thick, pruning is only one means of promotion; it often also needs to be combined with fertilizing. After all, if the plant is to maintain a good sprouting momentum after pruning, the nutrient supply must keep up, since the plant consumes a large amount of nutrients while maintaining vigorous growth, so we need to fertilize in time, and the fertilizing must be sufficient. Only then can we better promote the plant's sprouting and growth, and at the same time accumulate more nutrients for the bougainvillea to use for thickening the trunk.

Moreover, bougainvillea itself is relatively fond of fertilizer and also relatively tolerant of it. If the concentration is too low, you can appropriately increase the frequency of fertilizing; if the concentration is too high, you can appropriately reduce the frequency of fertilizing. But it is safer to follow the principle of “light fertilizer, applied frequently” when fertilizing, to avoid fertilizer burn caused by losing control of too high a fertilizer concentration. And to thicken the bougainvillea's trunk, you generally need to apply organic fertilizer and NPK compound fertilizer, and watering must also be sufficient, so as to ensure the fertilizer can be fully absorbed by the plant.

Of course, to grow the bougainvillea's trunk thick, besides focusing on strengthening the management of pruning and fertilizing, many other aspects of care and management cannot be ignored either. After all, the plant can only maintain normal growth in a suitable growing environment, and especially when it needs to maintain vigorous growth, you should meet its growing conditions in all aspects as much as possible. Matters such as light, temperature, ventilation, humidity and repotting are all factors that affect its growth.