While at the last plumeria show, I saw several plumeria pudica 'Bridal Bouquet' for sale that were in tree form. All this time I have been working trying to keep mine in bush form as I thought this was how it was supposed to grow? I chaulked up the tall growth to having minimum sun for all my plumeria. How does pudica naturally grow?

Here is my pink pudica. It was grafted but is the very same shape as the pudica 'Bridal Bouquet' that I saw at the show. Below that are my 'Bridal Bouquet" . Yeah, it looks bushy alright. But look closely how I made that happen. All those cuttings! That will have to be rectified next spring! Apparently mature pudica are trees, too???

Plumeria pudica is a small, bush-like tree It will get up to 12 ft tall, and if left unpruned will be bushy and dense with heavier flowering at the top. This is a good example.

I'm in trouble then! I have enough to have a Pudica grove!!!

So what is wrong with a pudica grove??

Nothing wrong with a pudica grove at all, if I had sunshine for it. As it is I have minimum 6 hours of sun on the driveway only. I might try to plant it along the driveway. I hope it doesn't become Pudica Death row.

ShadyGreenThumb said:I hope it doesn't become Pudica Death row.

that would be sad...

Okay, here's my 7 ft plumeria pudica in dormancy. Compare out of dormancy with the pictures above from August. I am open to suggestions on what to do with it right now. It had been trimmed many times. But it still remains leggy and tall. I have placed cuttings into the pot to get some bushiness from it as it stays bare for at least 4 feet. But as you can see, I have at least a million cuttings growing in there now. I won't be adding more cuttings to it this year.

What to do? If I separate them all I will end up with many leggy trees. But I will if that is what needs to be done.

Mine is about 12 years old and yes it is about 12 feet tall. I have pruned it a lot to try and make it look bushy but it doesn't. The main trunks are large. I have decided ti just leave it and have planted climbing aroids at the base yo grow up and fill the space

This is an example of what mine does. The stem that leads to this set of leaves is about 7 feet long. It was longer, so long it accidentally broke. You can see the broken end. Then a new node of leaves started coming out. So it drapes over kind of like a thick vine and hangs at eye level and these leaves form a flat rosette like a plate.

I have 2 nice containers full of cuttings I have taken from this plant while trying to get it to bush out, unsuccessfully.





This stem comes up from the ground and leafs out way over my head at a height of about 10-12 feet, in the greenhouse rafters.
I do not know why my plant is this leggy. There is no obstruction to it getting light.

@Gina1960. That is CRAZY! Mine would probably do the same if I didn't trim it up every year. But I trim it and it doubles in height...in a pot! Mine gets 6 hours of light max. I am thinking about moving it, thinning it out, cutting it in half (again), and making small cuts into the bark as suggested by another poster. Mine is still very dormant as most of my plumeria are. But it sits in the sunlight. I will decide this week. I've thought about moving it but the only full sun we have is in the front yard. Potted plants have disappeared from people's front yard so...decisions, decisions.

I may remove it completely and keep the nicer containers I made from cuttings. But the base is really big. I have some aroids planted around the base to climb up the trunk.