Every Species is different in the Prune Stage. If you can not find a Tube Video for your Tree,go to your local Nursery and they will show you how to prune your tree.

n/t

It will take a little time before the new leader is indistinguishable from the one that died back. If the leader died back in the winter, it might have been pushed too much for growth during the late summer and, not having enough time to harden off, was too succulent come winter. In most instances, a side branch will eventually gain leader dominance on its own, but that can be assisted by the gardener.

That is the most important thing to know before any pruning is done or
not done. BTW I really am an expert on this stuff.

.... it will not flower for @ least another 3 years. Work on developing a trunk and
its canopy structure ..... being tropical you can prune it @ almost anytime before
it starts going through its bloom cycle.

In the future try to plant only things that are native to your area. Although pretty
the flame tree will not help your local ecology/environment anywhere close to a
native plant. Also check to see if that tree is listed as an invasive plant too.

Sounds sensible, but do I lop off everything below?

Last edited Wed Mar 7, 2018, 11:27 AM - Edit history (1)

*SIDE*/LOWER buds are popping down below on the trunk, and I was asking whether I should trim these off. To focus more, I want this trunk to go UP as a full tree. WheelWalker's answer about a TOP bud being trained to take over as the lead/future trunk was great for that part of things.

I called a friend who does some basic gardening about what to do about the LOW buds, whether to snip them off NOW, sort of SHAVING them off? She said to let them grow out some, to where some of them might become actual branches, and then prune those off, that nipping them off any younger than the branch stage will only get them to keep budding.

Apologies for intruding into this group. I usually post everything in Lounge regardless of topic (except politics), and a couple of times I've been told there to take the posts to where they belong (Cooking; garden.ding, whatever), but everybody goes to Lounge and just about any answers can be found there, so I'll stay put there, thanks!1


***********ON EDIT: The tentatively-definitive answer::

I consulted an employee at a gardening center, showing him a picture of the 5 feet high trunks with the side sprouts, telling him what I wanted, which is to grow the trunk into a tree, not with branches down below. He said to leave the top one-foot of sprouts and to prune off all the buds below that. Shockingly, for sure to the experts, I asked whether this meant "shaving" off the buds. He was shocked and said *NO* just use an ordinary pruning hand tool, no need to go deeper. He said that the lower pruning will give strength to the top foot of sprouts, that soon it will be clear which one is the most appropriate one to become the trunk above, upon which the surrounding ones can be pruned.