Lou: There is an important question here for the future of your tree, but the photos do not give a clear answer. Are both of these leaders the result of your graft, or is one of them the graft and the other rootstock growth? If one of them is slightly higher than the other, the lower one may be emerging from the rootstock, and should be cut off immediately if you want your tree to be the variety of your grafted scion. Why is that wooden stake in the middle of photo #2? Has it got something to do with supporting the chicken wire around the tree, or are you trying to straighten up one of the leaders? Whether or not both of these leaders are emerging from your grafted scion, I would cut one of them off at the base, then drive a steel stake at one side and tie it up to grow vertically. Then I would prune the remaining leader back a few inches to encourage side branching next season. If your graft has grown over 3 feet in the 2nd season, I think the growth rate is good, but I agree with Ace that your should kill back the competing grasses in a 4-foot diameter circle around the tree, then mulch with an organic material like pine chips to a depth of several inches. If you get a good layer of mulch around the tree it shouldn't be necessary to add any additional fertilizer. And if you take any more photos, back up and give us an overall view of the tree, and a better close-up of the grafted area that is unobstructed by leaves. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

This is mainly for HairMetal4ever ... Firstly, sorry I'm late in posting back. Your suggestion for a picture was a good one (and I almost uploaded one) but I really decided that I'd just "wait & see". Well, I'm happy to tell you that, at long last, the tree leafed out and looks pretty good. As with most of my trees/shrubs, the harsh winter we had pushed the schedule back about 3+ weeks. But beyond that, the cicada larvae really took a toll on some of my shrubs, especially the rhododendrons - the ends of many branches croaked and withered. But the rhodies are quite resilient and came back. As I said, the poor Kousa dogwood limbs & twigs looked really bad (some were bent almost 180ð) and it took forever to set buds. It finally leaved out and set a few flowers (I'd say about half of what it did the year before) but I'm grateful that it seems to have rebounded. Poaky1 - I hope you don't have the mess we did w/ the cicadas. I remember that period - the incessant racket was surreal - like something out of a Stephen King movie! âº

Almost certainly those are seed grown trees, and assuming that is in fact the case, you may be waiting a few more years. Seed grown trees have to mature for a number of years (only they know how many) before they will flower. A grafted tree, takes a branch of another tree that becomes attached to the rootstock (another probable seed grown tree). This grafted portion "knows" that it is already some years old genetically, and therefore will begin flowering earlier. You likely seed grown tree will flower, but nobody can say how long that will be. BTW, flower buds are set in late summer the year before flowering, so you can examine your tree in the fall and determine if it will likely flower the following spring. The flower buds look kinda like an teardrop shaped onion in shape.You can find pictures on the net. Arktrees

Thanks, everyone! cearbhaill, I just went out and did a slight trim - what a different a minor haircut makes! The whole thing looks much neater now. Thanks! Now, I don't think that it shows much of a different in the photo below, but trust me, in reality, it is much neater. Some branches were literally growing along the ground!!! The branches are just a few inches off the ground but it is not that apparent in the photo though... Ken, I think that the photo before looked surreal because my phone camera somehow added some bokeh effect to it, so that the background is blurry! It didn't do that to this latest photo.... who knows why? These smart phones are getting too smart for their own sake! LOL! In terms of the staking, the little tree actually was not staked last year. Then it started to really lean badly towards one side, probably due to the wind direction. So this year, I just staked it gently, so that it will grow up with a straighter trunk. You can see that there is still a slight lean but not as bad as before. I agree that the stakes should be removed soon.