At the start of spring the trunk looked like it was thickening out, so I repotted. What do you mean by thickening out, and did you use that as an indication it needed repotting? Typically, root congestion starts to take a toll on growth, vitality (health), the plant's ability to defend itself, and eye appeal about the time that the soil/root mass can be lifted from the container intact.
As I said I'm a novice and just used the only compost I had which was GroPlus Seaweed Compost and I mixed in some coco coir. I've just checked, and it says that the compost is "packed with micronutrients and trace elements including phosphorus, calcium, magnesium, potassium, and growth hormones (such as auxins and cytokinins)." So maybe I've overdosed it on auxin. I'd take that advertising with a grain of salt (means 'doubt it' over here). Anything organic contains a wide variety of nutrients, and the growth regulators auxin and cytokinin are synthesized within the plant for its own purposes - so a bit of hype on the package
Auxin and cytokinin are antagonists that work at cross purposes with each other. One of auxin's jobs is to suppress lateral branch growth, one of cytokinin's is to stimulate suppressed buds. Usually, those buds wouldn't be breaking on your tree since it's apically dominant (auxin wins out over cytokinin in apically dominant trees to a large degree), but it's a bit of serendipity, so enjoy it.
I haven't done anything to the stem tip, but I have noticed the last few leaves haven't had a sheath and the last leaf was a much lighter green. I presume it's putting all its energy into growing the new stems and leaves. Ficus have an appendage called a stipule that often acts as a bud sheath, and which is shed as the leaf starts to open. They often go unnoticed.
I checked the plant this morning and another four nodes are starting to grow, and I think by tomorrow there should be two leaves on a couple of the lower new little branches so I will take your advice and pinch them. Great! To keep your tree at it's best, this pruning plan will be very helpful. Short internodes make the fullest and most compact plants. To ensure they all remain short, prune like this:
1) Keep pinching all branches back to 2 leaves all summer.
2) In September, stop pinching and allow your tree to grow unencumbered by pruning all winter. All the late fall, winter, and early spring growth will have long internodes, so prune all the longish growth back to the previous summer's growth, which will force back-budding.
3) Pinch all summer and restart the cycle again in fall and repeat year after year. You'll soon be thinning out branches in strategic areas to let more light into the middle of the canopy.
Keep in mind that your tree is programmed genetically to spend about 2/3 of its energy in the top 1/3 of the tree. This means you can (should, for best results) prune the top back harder and partially defoliate it to slow the top down (or else the branches in the top will grow heavy and the lower branches will weaken/wane). Pruning the top harder and removing some foliage here and there from the top is how you balance the tree's energy flow so the lower branches stay strong.
Too, as I noted, it's very helpful to remove the mature leaves when you see a branch growing in the leaf's axil (crotch).
Best luck. Keep us updated on your progress, please.
Al
