I think I might of been zealous and transplanted my tree.. I believe it’s a Iochroma.. Its been over a week. Do I leave it alone? Trim it? Leave the leaves? Looking for some guidance... thank you in advance. I live in the Central Valley of California zone 9 if that helps.
Hi there, Iochroma is a fantastic plant (a little hard to confirm from the photo alone). I am not super well versed in the maintenance of this plant but my understanding is that they're pretty resilient and recover well from stress. Remember that one week in plant time isn't super long. Transplanting is a very stressful experience for any plant (consider they tend to want to live their whole lives in one place). Trimming, pruning, or removal of parts of the plant adds to that stress, so my opinion falls under the "leave it alone for 6-12 months" category before pruning. However, again, I have heard Iochroma to be very resilient and perhaps people with more experience with this plant would recommend some form of pruning. One thing is for sure though- not pruning it won't be a cause of death for it. Pruning will add more stress to an already stressed plant. I am assuming it's getting extra water since it's been recently transplanted?
I agree with Andrew's response. The soil below the plant looks very dry in the photo. A plant like Iochroma would want a lot of water after transplant. I would drench the plant to make sure it is watered very thoroughly.
I would definitely trim it and/or remove many (most) leaves. When root systems are disturbed they cannot take in water as well as undisturbed roots. If the same number of leaves are kept then the plant can dry out and die even if the soil is wet since the disturbed roots cannot take in sufficient water to meet the needs of the leaves. In general, when I transplant in a way that disturbs the roots I trim plants quite severely to ensure they do not die of thirst.
THANK YOU so much for the encouragement and help! I’ll leave it alone tha I you I’ll make sure it gets more water!!! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and for the help!!!!!
