Fuchsia: a couple of questions

[Ingvill]

Does anyone here have any experience in growing fuchsia as bonsai?
I wanna try one or two, simply because of their beautiful flowers and shade tolerance.

I've read that they prefer slightly acidic soil, but not how acidic.
Would they like 100 % kanuma? Or a mix of kanuma and something else perhaps?

I've also been informed to "cut off all leaves and cut stems way back when putting inside for winter storage".
What exactly does that mean, cut way back? Leave an inch? Leave 10 inches?
And should I cut back all the stems while trying to thickening the trunk?

And lastly; they supposedly like to be a little rootbound in order to produce plenty of flowers.
But during a period of trunk thickening, I assume they should be in a big grow out box?

If anyone has any information to share, I would really appreciate it

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

I've had Fuchsia several times over the years. Usually somebody sees it in bloom and talks me into giving it, or selling it away. Old, second year and older wood is quite brittle, wire new branches first summer or plan to use mainly clip and grow.

Give them sun, water and moderate temperatures, and they will bloom. I never worried about root bound or not. They dislike heat, move to heavy shade when temperatures get over 85 F, or 30 C. They like to cool off at night, best below 70F, or 21 C. They won't do well long term in very hot dry climates. But less than ideal temps will be tolerated for a while, hybrids are more tolerant of temperatures than species.

I like informal upright styles, when you want flowers, let branches extend and weight of the blooms will cause lengthening stem to arch almost like a weeping tree. Flowers on new current growth, excessive pruning prevents blooms.

I use same sort of mix I use for my azalea. Yes, kanuma is okay. I use perlite, kanuma, fir bark blend, or pumice, fir bark, shredded NZ sphagnum blend. Or? Just about anything good for azalea, beech, hornbeam, & maples should work.

If you are willing to do repotting at least once every 24 months or more frequently, a peat moss based mix is good, just don't let it go too long. At 3 years peat mixes tend to go to anoxic muck, especially if you fertilize often. So peat moss is tricky, if you see the peat mix go bad, repot right away, even if it is not time to repot.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

Oops, double post

 

[Carol 83]

@Leo in N E Illinois do you bring them in for the winter? I have one on the patio, I could try it with.

 

[petegreg]

Hi Ingvill,
I put some information here and below it.

I grow mine potted in DE and it's fine, DE is around neutral.

General info like pruning... are for potted plant growers. And of course they work.

For bonsai we need some features we have to develop. If we don't have good trunk we have to grow them. Pruning and choping just for wintering is then counterproductive. Best to follow general rules how to grow trunks and ones you're satisfied with trunk...

For chopping and heavy pruning you can go really low, they bud back well.

There's no real need to remove all leaves before wintering. Fuchsias can drop some or all leaves or hold some that will be dropped after new growth starts. But there's nothing wrong to remove all leaves as you mentioned if a winter storage is below some 10C.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

@Carol 83 - Fuchsia species originally come from Andes mountains, Colombia, Peru, etc. Fairly high elevation. They take a frost, but it becomes tricky if the ground freezes. They are grown outdoors in southern UK, France, and other mild climates, probably zone 8 hardy. Not hardy in zone 6 or 5. I treat them as a tender sub-tropical, and keep them growing all winter by putting them under 18 hours of light with the orchids. With the long day length, I get blooms in winter too.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

@Ingvill
I agree with @petegreg - the winter pruning advice you found is not productive for bonsai, if you can keep them above 10 C and bright, you can keep them growing all winter. Being that the original species come from areas near the equator, they don't have to have a "winter rest".

Grow them out and prune just to get them bushy until you have the trunk thickness you desire. Its relatively easy to get trunk diameter over 5 cm, 2 inches, in a few years, but trunk diameters over 10 cm, 4 inches, are not easy to get when growing part of the year indoors. So best for medium to shohin size bonsai.

The more leaves you have the quicker the trunk diameter will increase. Once you have the trunk diameter you want you can prune back, they will back bud on old wood.

And if you allow the flowers to develop fruit, the fruit is edible and flavorful, sweet, with a little tartness.

 

[Ingvill]

Thank you both for excellent and thorough information, this was incredibly helpful

The flowers are so beautiful and the plant fits so perfectly in my climate, so I don't mind if the trunk will never be really thick.
I'll follow you guys's advice and hopefully they will thrive!

Yours is absolutely lovely by the way, @petegreg

 

[petegreg]

Thank you both for excellent and thorough information, this was incredibly helpful

The flowers are so beautiful and the plant fits so perfectly in my climate, so I don't mind if the trunk will never be really thick.
I'll follow you guys's advice and hopefully they will thrive!

Yours is absolutely lovely by the way, @petegreg

Thank you for your kind words. That one looks every year a little bit different. This spring I acquired 4 more cultivars, instead of satsuki, because I can keep them happy 3-4 years and then one winter they die on me.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

I can vouch for the hardines of these plants. Popped right back up after -15°C this winter.
Expect some die back though, the branches don't seem to be built for resisting frost. Not for the first year at least.

 

[akhater]

I tried to layer a fuchsia this morning and noticed they don't have real 'wood' ?‍
Do you think it might still give me roots? How well they do from cuttings?
Thanks

 

[eryk2kartman]

Ive couple of fuchsias, im in Ireland 8b, this year we only got light frost for couple of nights around -5°C and some of them died back to the ground lvl, some lost the tops.
They are all pre-bonsai so not a big deal but not sure if ive done something wrong ? I would like to avoid that situation in future.
They were left outside for winter, not in a windy spot or anything.

 

[AJL]

Ive grown a selection of small flowered varieties for over 5 years now - hardy species eg Fuchsia magellanica cultivars and have them outdoors all year round here in England. Probably best protected in a cool sheltered spot or unheated greenhouse during severe frosty weather as young plants can die back to ground level .
They do root slowly from old woody cuttings taken in spring or airlayer, or from semi ripe and softwood cuttings.

 

[AJL]

Heres another Fuchsia magellanica cultivar grown from a hardwood cutting in 2 years!

 

[akhater]

Heres another Fuchsia magellanica cultivar grown from a hardwood cutting in 2 years!

This was a cutting? Looks pretty thick one right?

 

[AJL]

Yes it was propagated spring 2 years before
My neighbour was cutting down an old Fuchsia magellanica hedge so I collected several gnarly looking branches around 25mm [1 inch] diameter , cut them into @25 cm [10inch]lengths, dipped in rooting powder and planted them in a trench in my allotment and left them there for the summer, with occasional watering when I remembered.
I lifted them in the autumn and potted up the best of them. Out of about 20 cuttings at least 15 rooted.

 

[akhater]

Yes it was propagated spring 2 years before
My neighbour was cutting down an old Fuchsia magellanica hedge so I collected several gnarly looking branches around 25mm [1 inch] diameter , cut them into @25 cm [10inch]lengths, dipped in rooting powder and planted them in a trench in my allotment and left them there for the summer, with occasional watering when I remembered.
I lifted them in the autumn and potted up the best of them. Out of about 20 cuttings at least 15 rooted.

Nice! good to know it roots from thick cuttings thanks for sharing the experience

 

[PaleFire]

How does a Fuchsia handle root pruning? I need to repot my 'Dollar Princess,' and was curious if they're hateful like pines or easy like maples?

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

I found fuchsia to be pretty forgiving of root pruning. Probably more tolerant than maples.