Greetings all, from a newbie in Central Pennsylvania, where the
temp
hasn't reached 30 for weeks !!

snip


At the moment I have two azaleas beside my house (obviously
dormant)
that I think will make good candidates.
They've been growing alongside the house for over 6 years and
haven't
grown over 8 inches tall, with 3/4" trunks.
Poor ground conditions (clay etc) has kept them small. Each
spring they
produce a handful of little red flowers and leaves which last
all summer
and into the fall. At the moment, they look pretty sad.

I'd like to remove them from the ground and stick them into
pots, but
I'm not sure when is the best time to attempt this, and what
other
precautions I should take.

AFTER they have bloomed.

Wash ALL soil away from the roots with a HARD jet of water. Make
certain all the cut ends of the roots have been cut by a SHARP
instrument, add a little rooting hormone to the cut ends, then
plant each in an oversize pot of its own in a coarse bonsai soil
and ground-up spaghnum moss, perhaps with some compost added,
trim back the tops by about 1/3.

Then find a local bonsai club (better yet, find one NOW) and
follow their advice for azaleas in your area.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Our life is
frittered away by detail . . . . Simplify! Simplify. -- Henry
David Thoreau - Walden

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