My redbud sapling seems to have a lot of competing branches up near the top of the leader. Should I think these out? The top almost looks two-dimensional.
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Use a piece of metal conduit pipe or some rigid and straight length of something and tape it to the trunk firmly with vinyl electric tape (you can press it into the ground a ways). Remove the weaker or the two shoots on top and tape the other to the post to straighten your new leader. The idea is to keep the trunk straight and remove branches coming off it more than half the diameter of the trunk at the point the branch is connected to the trunk.
You can also use a shorter piece of wood or something and start your splint further up the tree.
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I would try to sustain central leader dominance, either by removing scaffolds more than half the diameter of the leader, or by slowing down the competition by pinching or lightly pruning back excessively competitive branches at least 2 or 3 times during the growing season. There is no reason to remove low branches early in the life of such trees- they help create taper to the trunk and create a stronger tree.
If you are particularly interested in this stuff, I suggest you purchase a used copy of Harris’s book Arboricculture, published by Prentiss Hall. Earlier editions can be had for a song and contain almost all the useful info as later ones.
Yours looks pretty gangly to me. I just saw my dad’s today, until recently I would prune it for him. Every year or so I took off a lower scaffold or two, it’s definitely time to take one or two more off the underside. It’s gotten really nice and bushy finally. The hope is to get it shading the hydrangea so it’s doesn’t scorch in the summer.
I don’t know if yours grows like his, but I would take off the bottom 2-4 scaffolds from yours if it was my call.
Mine is only 4 years old.
I think he got his 2 years ago, seems pretty similar to me. My advice would be to (gently) shave off some lower scaffolds and give it a little more time to turn into a proper tree.
I’ll admit, I wasn’t thrilled when my dad bought a red bud ( no fruit!), and I was pessimistic about its growth and training, but it’s turned into a very pretty, low maintenance front yard shade tree. If you’re looking for an easy, ornamental plant, you could do a heck of a lot worse!
My experience is that redbuds are ugly ducklings as saplings but get better with age.
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My little experience with Redbud would show that narrow crotch angles are a big problem with Redbud. I had one grow big and pretty and literally fall apart on me.
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To my knowledge you actually can eat the flowers on red buds. They are in the pea family. Has anyone tried these?
Any update pics?
Taste like peas, good in salads. My handy tree split and was removed after a massive storm over winter, so have to forage for salad.
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I just pruned mine. It’s been in ground since 2018 I think… It split during a windstorm maybe 2 summers ago and appears to be healing nicely. I pruned it by maybe 30% last year and did maybe 20% this year so far, I may take more. It does have a tendency towards very poor crotch angles and lots of drooping limbs below horizontal. That may be due to the massive amount of growth it has now that it’s established and just looking for more sunlight (to shade out my vegetable garden 
). Planning is important. I am going to try rooting some cuttings for fun, this tree has the hombre look to the leaves instead of being straight green, they all start yellow.
