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Hello,

I am just starting to grow a Wisteria bonsai from a seed, and I am a little confused about a couple of things. I have read that you should wait about a year before pruning a bonsai, but seeing as a wisteria vine can grow ~10 feet a year, I feel as if this rule may not hold.

Also, my vine grew up a couple of inches, then forked into 3 "branches" with leaves. My question is should I attach these branches to the support pole I have in the pot, or will the vine keep growing up and continue to send out the branches?

I can attach pictures of what I'm talking about if needed, but I don't have them now. Thank you guys so much in advance!

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As i think you still have 1 branch, but with 2 leaves on each side.

To be clearer than that, this is one leaf!

In winter this will fall off entirely.

I would suggest letting it grow 10feed, so it can gain vigor and can fatten up faster, then keeping it small.

Interesting! I had no clue that's a leaf, but looking at it, I can see that it connects to the main branch just like a maple leaf would. In that case, it appears I have 3 leaves, and the growth of the main stem seems to be slowed- perhaps that is an invitation to fertilize a bit more. Taking the pictures also made me realize that something has been munching on one of the leaves- maybe I can use some neem oil to help prevent any more damage.

To clarify your advice, are you saying let it grow 10 feet, then cut it down to the 2-3' that I'd like it to stay? Once again thank you so much for the help

To be honest, before you can turn that into anything “bonsai” you’d have to let it grow entirely unimpeded (and possibly in full ground) for at least half a decade, THEN prune it back to 2 feet…

Doing it now or next year will bring you nothing…

I agree, just let it grow freely to become thicker. It will take at least 5-10 years before you need to do any pruning. This is not a bonsai, it’s just a sapling that could become a bonsai if all the right techniques are applied on the right moments in the year, during decades.

A mature tree can grow 10 ft in a year. I would be amazed to see a sapling do that

lucR wrote: It will take at least 5-10 years before you need to do any pruning.

This is not good advice for wisterias.
They are vines and tendrils will grow a lot in 5 years without pruning.
I mean a lot, meters long.
As a general rule, it must be pruned back before the flower buds will form, every summer.
I can see the reasoning of cutting it back hard after 10 years (that's when they start to bloom, after 10 years), but if left untouched for so many years it will take over the whole house.

10 years to bloom? Now I have to disagree:)
I have a wisteria grown from seed which is now 5 years old, that had its first flowers this year. Always in a pot, and even heavily fertilised.

Clicio wrote:

lucR wrote: It will take at least 5-10 years before you need to do any pruning.

This is not good advice for wisterias.
They are vines and tendrils will grow a lot in 5 years without pruning.
I mean a lot, meters long.
As a general rule, it must be pruned back before the flower buds will form, every summer.
I can see the reasoning of cutting it back hard after 10 years (that's when they start to bloom, after 10 years), but if left untouched for so many years it will take over the whole house.

Yeah, 10 years entirely untouched is a bit much. 5 years not necessarily so. Mostly depends on where you're letting it grow.

The neighbour has one growing on the fence, probably 7-8 years old by now, about 12 or 15 meters long and left entirely untouched, with no pruning at all. (It has been flowering profusely for the last 2 or 3 years BTW)
Still, its base is probably only 4-5 cm thick.

If I were to turn it into a bonsai, I would have started pruning back 2 or 3 years ago, as I think it could have made growth even faster, but it would have been time to put back to the desired lenght about now, if I were to go for a small-ish bonsai.

But then, given the large size of their leaves and flowers, wisterias only make decent bonsai if they're on the large side (> chu). And for a plant that big to make an impression, the trunk would need to be at least 10cm thick.

Meaning probably >20yo plant.
Would certainly make sense if you happen to find/have an old one to dig or airlayer, but starting from scratch is a bit much for me...