De-pup or no de-pup E. eugene maraisii

[Brian]

I have two E. eugene maraisii that are from the same seed batch. I removed the pups from one of them little over a year ago. Now I’m pondering removing the pups from the other one although I do like the look and it’s nice to have a difference between the two. 
What would you guys do? Would you also remove the pups from the second one?

This is the one which has the pups.

This one has had the pups removed.

please help me make up my mind.

Thanks 

[JohnAndSancho]

Both look great, so I'm no help unless there's a market for you to sell the pups to pay some bills.

[Brian]

No market here. It would be for purely aesthetic purposes.

[Urban Rainforest]

Its purely a matter of personal preferance. Your plants both look healthy and well grown! I have 5 big Eugenes and one of them has 5 pups. When they get get bigger I will harvest them. There is a little bit if a market for them in So Cal though.

[Tracy]

Tough call.  My thought is based on proximity.  It looks like they are in the same type of raised planters.  If they are adjacent to one another, I would say symmetry matters.  In that case I would remove pups so you have the same balanced look of a single caudex and the formal structure that an Encephalartos eugene-maraisii gives.  If on the other hand, you aren't looking at the two in close proximity, you can leave the pups on the one to have a different look.  I know that my E cupidus, E nubimontanus which have several pups get a little tangled and don't have the formal symmetrical look that solitary ones have.

let us know what you decide to do Brian.

[Brian]

10 hours ago, Tracy said:

Tough call.  My thought is based on proximity.  It looks like they are in the same type of raised planters.  If they are adjacent to one another, I would say symmetry matters.  In that case I would remove pups so you have the same balanced look of a single caudex and the formal structure that an Encephalartos eugene-maraisii gives.  If on the other hand, you aren't looking at the two in close proximity, you can leave the pups on the one to have a different look.  I know that my E cupidus, E nubimontanus which have several pups get a little tangled and don't have the formal symmetrical look that solitary ones have.

let us know what you decide to do Brian.

What you say makes sense and is the feedback I was looking for, thanks. In this case the raised planters are far apart, about 30 meters, and you can not see both of them at the same time. My minds made up, Im going to leave the pups on one of them as you says, to give it a different look.