I identified this azalea as a potential bonsai last winter. It had previously been dug up and plunked in some muddy ground in the back of the yard, but had produced lots of new growth and was flourishing several years later. I noticed it has some nice gnarly trunks and surface roots, so after the blooms fell off in June 2013, I dug it up.
Here it is after root pruning to remove any dead roots or roots that were too long. I also heavily pruned the branches again.
It took a long time, probably 3-4 weeks, for new growth to appear, but it eventually did produce lots of new branches.
I then selected which new branches to keep and removed the rest. I basically kept two branches at each point, removing any the grew out of the top or bottom of the branches, keeping only those coming out of the sides. I also tried to balance the size of the branches, removing ones that were very vigorous or very weak unless I really needed a branch in a specific position. Because of how late it is in the year now, I will wait to do any further pruning until next year. Given how slow it was to back bud, I am afraid if I were to prune it again now, the new growth prompted by the pruning wouldn't have time to harden off before Winter.
The new growth was quick to fill in, so I did end up pruning back several of the more vigorous shoots in late August. Here it is on October 21st.
