A pine

[MattA]

I picked up this lanky pine about 6mths ago because until now I have never owned any pines besides the few I killed many years ago as a beginner. It was lightly repotted when I got it home and allowed to do its thing until now....

R0016097rz.jpg

R0016096rz.jpg

Its looking pretty healthy to me so I am now seriously looking at the options. Stats... overall height 200cm, trunk dia of 7cm straight as a telephone pole & still 5cm dia at 150cm!

Potential?

Rubbish?

Matt

[Guy]

all those low branches give you plenty of options for low trunk chop

[alpineart]

Hi MattA , every tree has potential ,if you cant see it now have a look in a year or two . I have trunks here that have not had work done for years , probably got too many . If it live it has prospects . The best thing it has going for it is all the branches lower down giving plenty of options for the future .

Cheers Alpineat

[LLK]

There are 115 species of pine. Which one is this?
Don't you guys like to know what material you have before you start working on it, or (worse) give advice on it ?

Lisa

[MattA]

Guy, Yep low trunk chop in the long term...

Alpine, it was your post that made me buy this tree.. I liked "Alpinus constructus" and it was in the back of my head when I brought this baby. I dont know if I would go to the same lengths with all the grafting (never done any & would probably stuff it up). I do see a couple of potential air layers & theres lots of small back buds in close to start again.

There are 115 species of pine. Which one is this? Pinus radiata
Don't you guys like to know what material you have before you start working on it, NOor (worse) give advice on it ?

Lisa

I try not to give advice as each has their own views & ways. I share what i know from my own experiences as limited as they are.

As to knowing what species something is... If it has survived being collected & is thriving in my care, what need to know its name

Matt

[Guy]

[bodhidharma]

Of course there is potential Radiata layer easily, you have low branching, you are young It looks healthy and it is Sunday. You should be out working on it as we speak get to it.

[alpineart]

A slight correction , there is well over 200 species of genuine 2 needle pines alone , then there is the 1 needle , 3 needle and 5 needle pines ,i believe that equates to well over 1000 various species /cultivars and then there are the naturally cross pollinated and genically modified tree's that i have never bothered to research . That equates to literally well over a thousand different species in the pinus genus .Many will never be truely identified due to the cross pollination by the wind . I have an unidentified pine here that 2 Northern hemisphere Guru's whom i have personally contacted with all the pics required for a good assessment and they cant identify it , yet i must have originated from Europe or at least the Northern Hemisphere . I had some help from a member in as a place in Canberra which will test and ID the tree however they require all the samples which are not available at one time . If anyone can assist with this department i will definately follow it through .

Cheers Alpineart

[MattA]

A slight correction , there is well over 200 species of genuine 2 needle pines alone , then there is the 1 needle , 3 needle and 5 needle pines ,i believe that equates to well over 1000 various species /cultivars and then there are the naturally cross pollinated and genically modified tree's that i have never bothered to research . That equates to literally well over a thousand different species in the pinus genus .Many will never be truely identified due to the cross pollination by the wind . I have an unidentified pine here that 2 Northern hemisphere Guru's whom i have personally contacted with all the pics required for a good assessment and they cant identify it , yet i must have originated from Europe or at least the Northern Hemisphere . I had some help from a member in as a place in Canberra which will test and ID the tree however they require all the samples which are not available at one time . If anyone can assist with this department i will definately follow it through .

Cheers Alpineart

That gave me a headache just reading it... Think i will stick to not knowing

BTW in case anyone missed it in RED... this is Pinus radiata..

[MattA]

Of course there is potential Radiata layer easily, you have low branching, you are young It looks healthy and it is Sunday. You should be out working on it as we speak get to it.

No rush mate, I have a few native yamadori that are much more appealing to work on...

[LLK]

A slight correction , there is well over 200 species of genuine 2 needle pines alone , then there is the 1 needle , 3 needle and 5 needle pines ,i believe that equates to well over 1000 various species /cultivars and then there are the naturally cross pollinated and genically modified tree's that i have never bothered to research . That equates to literally well over a thousand different species in the pinus genus

Now we are talking about varieties, not about species.
As said, there are about 115 species. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine ahnd also some notes on taxonomic ranking: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine Anyway, I should have asked if you didn't want to know what variety of pine you had, not what species. So, sorry about that, as well as for the fact that I didn't see the pine being labeled as Radiata until the last message of yesterday.
I won't apologise for the fact that I got schoolmistressy about naming that pine. There is such a lack of precision generally about names and characteristics that it doesn't seem wrong to remind fellow forum members that these things matter, whatever your point of view may be, Matt.
Bonsai is an art that requires discipline and precision - why not include names and characteristics in these?

Last but not least: I wish you lots of fun with your big pine babe!!

Lisa

[MattA]

Some of us come to bonsai without a need to know all the names or even if it meets the japanese standard. Its all about having fun, including how this was posted. I prefer not to be limited by what i do not know or have not mastered.

Time for some ringbark airlayers (& yes i know the book says not to do this!)

Matt

Edit :- remove wasted breathe

[Gareth]

Jeez there is one in every crowd. Guess there is no need for an identification section if only people who know exactly what they have on their benches are allowed on this forum now hahahahahaha.

BIG bend i recon matt, and some pruning, tyre inner tube and lots of wire, and of course a chop. But i have wanted a tree like this to corkscrew the hell out of for a while, or at least see someone do another skippy style engineering feat.

[MattA]

Gareth, Next time your over here I will let you tear into it... I gotta see anyone do a big bend on that baby, without Skippy engineering first that is;)

As for the rest, I got used to it two decades ago.. now it just makes me laugh & on the odd occasion cry (for how P******C it is)

Atleast i am still welcomed here on AB... by some anyways

Matt

[Gareth]

i think you got me mixed up with someone who knows what they are doing, be buggered if i can do any heavy work on a pine that big, but hey, we can always give it a crack, see what happens.

Yeah, i chucked a bit, some people need to lighten up.

ANYWHO, you liek the idea of a heavy twist and bend, and a few cuts, VIRTS ANYONE??????