AusBonsai

This is a variegated juniper iv had between the benches and grow beds pretty much since the beginning...
Never been sure of what to do with it as it has very leggy course foliage, but the bones for a decent shohin..

First photo shows it about a year ago before I started branch selection. And the second photo shows it today. It was wired about 6 weeks ago and i have slowly been tweaking it to the stage it's at now..

The lowest branch will probably go eventually but decided to leave it for vigour and as a back up incase another branch dies... Hopefully when I get it in a smaller pot it will restrict the growth a bit and I can compact the course foliage.

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Nice movement ,good luck with taming the growth.I like the deadwood and how it goes against the natural flow . Cheers John.

unfortunately i think this one has bitten the dust...
it seemed to be responding well to the work but the foliage has dried up over the last few days and is showing no signs of bouncing back.
it has happened very sudden and over the entire tree, although i pushed it pretty hard im thinking it may of actually been due to a couple of days without water when i had a weekend away about a month ago... timing definitely adds up..

Thanks for sharing!!

And thank you for being so honest about it passing away I've lost a couple trees recently and it does not feel good.

Mbunro wrote:unfortunately i think this one has bitten the dust...
it seemed to be responding well to the work but the foliage has dried up over the last few days and is showing no signs of bouncing back.
it has happened very sudden and over the entire tree, although i pushed it pretty hard im thinking it may of actually been due to a couple of days without water when i had a weekend away about a month ago... timing definitely adds up..

Hi Mbunro,

Terrible news mate.

Potentially the missed watering could have caused the issue but Juniper don't mind drying out, if it was only a weekend, chances are a decent watering would have saved it.

Juniper species gain strength through their foliage as opposed to the root system. This means that removing too much foliage during the growing season (spring summer and even autumn) can cause the tree to go into shock and die.

In general removing more than 25-30% of a juniper's foliage during the growing season should be avoided. It is possible to remove up to 50% in winter but even then you would want to ensure the tree is healthy and strong.