Beaucarnea recurvata

[Ade Shattock]

I damaged my pony tail Beaucarnea recurvata while bringing it into the conservatory before winter, the top 8" to 10" snapped clean off but thankfully its continued growing from the original growing point, the problem is that the plant has a big 15" across the base and is 8 foot tall plus another 16" of pot so you can imagine its pretty close to the conservatory roof so pruning it has been on my mind.
Now Im pretty confident that it will shoot again from either the trunk or from the base should I prune it back hard and given a few years could become a most desirable multi trunked plant but Im thinking of the cut off bits, would a cut trunk re-root as might a Cordyline or a Yucca ?

I dont intend doing this just yet but as I cant let the plant grow too much more in height and if I keep lopping the top to keep it below the roof then as it loses lower leaves the crown becomes smaller and smaller then I'll need to take the pruning option at some point.

Anyone ever tried pruning and growing the off cuts ?
Any thoughts on doing so ?

[Ade Shattock]

second pic shows new growth

[Ade Shattock]

Ah ok so pictures load in reverse

[David Matzdorf]

That looks to me as if it has made itself a new growing point at the top of the snapped-off stem, which is what you'd expect from a plant with strong apical dominance. I think what will be interesting is to see if the diversion of auxins from the lost growing point will, in the near future, cause it to form additional growing points along the main trunk. Keep us posted...

[Ade Shattock]

That was my hope after the top snapped David, it happens naturally with age so maybe, just like a Cordyline, it'll sprout after damage.