It's been in this pot for a very long time, not watered and left in a fairly shaded area but is still alive. Can I do anything to make it healthy and more attractive looking again?
Yes, it can be revived by repotting in a slightly larger pot, using a soil based compost like John Innes No 3 and relocating the pot to a sunny position. Elevate your pot with pot feet or similar to ensure good drainage and keep the soil moist but not waterlogged while it recovers. There's plenty of green there, so there's hope!
That's great, thank you. Will leaves appear again on the lower portions of the branches or will it always have bare branches with leaves only on the ends now?
If you lightly prune the ends of each branch, that will trigger buds to form from the leaf nodes below, producing a bushier plant. Keep doing this as the plant grows and you will encourage the plant to produce a fuller shape - in a similar way as regularly trimming a hedge to make it thicker.
Thank you, that's good to hear. Should it eventually look like a normal small tree? I'm not sure what to expect or aim for. I've seen lollipop style bay trees in pots before, but this hasn't been pruned in that way. Should it have the 'trunk' type bits at the bottom bare and then all of the higher branches covered in leaves? Or would it always look a bit bare in the middle?
Bay will respond to hard pruning (a friend had a massive one that was cut down to the ground by frost and regrew perfectly well). I don't think that one will make a good lollipop though, unless one of the trunks is already straight and vertical and you can take out all the others.
Make sure the rootball is damp all the way through before you repot it. The best way is to dunk the whole pot in a large bucket of water and hold it under the surface until the air bubbles stop rising, then let it drain for a while.
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
It's been in this pot for a very long time, not watered and left in a fairly shaded area but is still alive. Can I do anything to make it healthy and more attractive looking again?
I would stand it in a bucket of water for a few days to give it time to rehydrate, then pot on into a bigger pot. Trim off any dead growth.
Mine, although a lot older than yours, was in a worse state I repotted and cut it back really,really hard last year. It could do with a bit more shaping but it's doing well. Its recovery time was spent in light shade. I don't know if that's necessary but it didn't do it any harm I did it this time last year.
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I repotted and cut it back really,really hard last year. It could do with a bit more shaping but it's doing well. Its recovery time was spent in light shade. I don't know if that's necessary but it didn't do it any harm
I did it this time last year.