All the branches, or just the lower ones?

if its just some its quit normal and healthy .

I was told when I got a tiny one last year that they like to have their roots restricted.

no they can get quit huge so i wouldnt think that could possibly be true willinilli x .

Lord, it's amazing how urban myths, or chinese whispers, prevail. Willinilli, Noseypotter is absolutely right - this plant does not like its roots restricted, it's a large tree, or will be at maturity. Grows in perfectly ordinary garden soil, or in a pot for a couple of years initially, after which it will need planting out.

its one of the oldest plants/living things known to man . here well before the dinosaurs . 100`s of millions of years and there very tollerent of different soils and very hardy and naturaly have some brown growth on there branches . there is a rarer form that grows into trianguler shapes thats quit amazing and to finish it off monkeies dont live anywear near these trees i9n there natural habitat . thats just something made up bye i think elizabethans and now its become some kind of fact or as bamboo sais chinese whispers . you often see them in there full glory next to big old statley homes with the lower branches cut of thow they do fall of to .

The common name monkey puzzle comes from the fact that monkeys can't climb it, so its a 'puzzle' for them trying to work out how to do so without being stabbed, and also because the branches are said to resemble the tail of some monkeys, noseypotter.
I thought the oldest plant known to man was the Ginkgo biloba, myself, I think that was around when the dinosaurs were.