It’s time to crop and bonsai your adenium plant. The growing season is in full swing. You want to give your adenium plants the best chances to sprout new branches and to thicken your caudex. Its way past flowering season for you desert rose plants. Yes, you can have a second flowering if you cropped your plant earlier right after the first flowering of your adenium plant in spring.
Know your growing season! In the north you may only have 5..6 months of plant growing before the weather changes and causes your adenium plant to go dormant. If your desert rose plant has long branches crop them now to give time for new branches to grow before the end of the adenium growing season.If your desert rose plant is tall and has many long branches you may want to consider wiring wrapping them and force then to grow a canopy layer instead of straight up. When you wire wrap your adenium plant make sure you are very careful not to break the branch.
AdeniumRose Company recommends that you deeply water the plant the day BEFORE your wire wrap the desert rose branches. This ensure that the adenium branches are full of water and more pliable. Its better to wire wrap the branches as the adenium plants grow from just a few inches instead of trying to wrap long ones that many break. Have a great summer!
THe adeniums I have gotten form you are blooming and are impressive. Thanks for the recommendation.
I have two plants from another vendor that I have had for two years now. They really don’t want to make leaves. One produces a few damaged leaves, the other none at all. The plants are firm and seem otherwise okay. Any suggestions?
I appreciate the tip on micronutrients. i will try that. I am told also that foliar spray with kelp extract is a good way to provide micronutrients, but I will likely use micromax. I fertilize with Miracle Gro, which is supposed to have the micro’s, but I have several plants with deficiencies, so I am suspicious.
Micro grow has too much nitrogen which the plants (succulents, cactus and especially adeniums) do not like. When you say damaged leaves what do they look like?? When using products with kelp make sure you dilute it to 30% strength than what they suggest. We do use kelp extract but very diluted. How much light are the plants getting? Have you re-potted the problem plants?
You know plants were not made to grow inisde, really. Nothing is native to indoors I have been a landscaper for 14 years and I have trouble with houseplants. I can only grow them if they are IN a window. And my availabilty of windows is on the north side. I water my plants once a week. That is I take them to the sink, fill them up with water and let them drain there. And I spritz them with water from a spray bottle. After they’ve drained I take them back to their saucer in the window. NEVER plant in those pots that have saucers attached! They are terrible. Mine are in about 6 inch to 8 inch pots. Larger pots will not need water as often as they don’t dry out so quickly. Whatever bug you have, take the plant outside and spray it with a safer soapy insecticide thoroughly. Let it dry and bring it back. Good luck
Hello again!
I have 3 desert roses I need to crop. One of which is a wonderful specimen given to me that has great potential. Here are some specifics.
Since I am unsure of which is exactly the caudex I will try to paint a picture.
The overall mass that is just above ground is 21″. Then the main trunk is 9.25″ which then splits to a wye whose 2 branches are 5.25″. I was wondering if there was a maximum branch size that could be safely cropped? I was wanting to get branches to shoot out different directions starting lower on the plant. Also is there a recommended sealer for those cuts?
Ok – without images its a bit harder to determine where to crop a particular adenium plant. You are in an area not as tropical as Miami but very close so your desert rose plants should be growing fast this summer due to all the rain. The distance between the branches and the main part of the adenium caudex may be a bit long. I would not have more than 5″ (1/4 the size of the caudex mass width) above the caudex if possible to encourage fatter caudex and lower branching. If you are trying to build a canopy type bonsai adenium then I would crop about above 4″ caudex. Your mass is 21″ wide but how high does the main mass go up before the trunk? I may be giving you wrong information if the adenium caudex ends right below the branching of the trunk. You can insert an image into the post or send via email (attachment). If your caudex mass in almost at the branch height then crop just below the branch to helpfully get 3 or more branches to grow where you just had two. We do this type of cropping all the time with our adeniums and usually get 3..5 branches to start where there use to be just 1..2 branches. It does not happen all the time but your plant is very well established so I would not be surprises if the desert rose grow several new branches where you just had two.
Hi everyone
I am a new desert rose owner and i will need as much advice i can get on the care and maintenance of the plant. Firstly,i will like to know what kind of soil mix should i give the plant. Secondly, my plant only has two branches and i will like to know if it will produce more branches later on.
Thirdly, Is miracle gro all purpose fertilizer a good fertilizer to use on the plant?
No we do not recommend miracle grow because the nitrogen is too high for the adenium desert rose plants. Try to find a time released fertilizer where the first number is low (below 10). We use a time release fertilizer 7-7-10 for our adeniums. The only time we use liquid based fertilizer for the desert roses plant is when we re-pot them and dip the plants in super-thrive hormone with micro-nutrients for a few minutes.
Next without knowing what part of the country you live and your climate I will not be able to tell you when to crop your branches on your desert rose plant. This blog has several posts concerning the proper soil mix. Please review the other posts for exact soil contents and more information concerning fertilizing adenium plants. If you reply with your approximate location I can give you more details on when to crop your branches to create more branches.
Hi,
I live in Australia so the seasons are reversed. Could you explain to me when it is I need to cut back my desert rose? Is it just after spring flowering and then after summer flowering, or can it be more often? I really need more branches to grow out as I only have two currently. Also are they supposed to drop all their leaves over the winter?
Good Day:
We crop our adenium plants (not all but the ones that need it) two times a year: 1) After the desert rose plants flowers which is usually right before new leaf growth occurs and 2) In mid summer during growing season so you still have at least 2 months of growing season left. Now, if you are in a area that gets a very mild winter (average temps above 60 degrees year round ) you can crop your adenium desert rose plants as late as October. We just cropped some of our plants this past weekend. We are very tropical so our winters are mild. Our adenium plants grow just about year round. The adeniums do slow down in Fall/Winter in our area including loosing some leaves due to decrease in sunlight but they grow back quickly.
If you have hybrids make sure you do not crop below where the adenium was grafted!
P.S. Take the pieces you cropped off and grow them too! With practice 50% or more of your cropped branches will survive to create new adenium plants.
someone just gave me a potted dessert rose a2 feet high 1″ trunk i live in venice fl it is 2/21/13 when should i prune it, has it has 3 branches with green leaves and 3 small sprouts growing at the base thank you
thank you for your questions about adenium plants. Sorry for the delay in answering it. Since you are in Venice, Florida I would wait until next month when all possibilities of frost is over. The adenium plant is way too tall for an 1″ trunk/caudex. I would leave the 3 small sprouts/branches on you desert rose plant alone because you want many branches coming from the base/caudex of the adenium obesum plant to grow the caudex larger. if it was my adenium plant I would crop it about 6″ above the caudex (fat part of the trunk) or about 1.5″ above the 3 sprouting adenium plant branches if the branches are higher up.
It is raining season now in the philippines… Is it OKAy to leave the adenium plant outside the house while the rain is pouring?
Yes – we are growing the adenium plants a tropical environment and it rains just about everyday during from May through October (some years like last year through December). It’s hot, high humidity and just wet. Having said that is you are using the right soil and nutrients the adenium plants will do great! Remember the rain drains nutrients from the soil.