Bunjin Italian Pine

[Watto]

This is my first entry in the "aged" section. Its an Italian Stone Pine that was given to me, along with about 5 others of the same variety more than 10 years ago by a friend that worked in nursery. The nursery tried to grow these as a wind break tree, like radiata pine, but could not sell them to the local graziers.
This tree was very tall and skinny so I thought it would be "good fun" to bend it in half. So with a bit of raffia, wire and a few guy wires I bent it right over. I did leave the raffia and wire on a bit too long and it marked the trunk, but that is now a "feature" (the wire and raffia was on for about two years).
Late spring 2004 I put it in this Japanese drum pot for the first time and it has been trimmed, changed, altered and re-designed probably ever year since then - plus a couple of re-pottings.
This year I finally decided on a direction for both the remaining branches, one up and one down. The one up I intend to make the new crown out of.
There is a front view and a back view, but I am open to suggestions.

[stymie]

Its worth noting that right handed people prefer trees which lean to the right and vicky verky. I'm right handed but in this case the first view wins because of the better soil entry, the other side is a bit unstable at soil level although the top may be slightly more interesting.

[Pup]

I find your remark on left and right, as somthing I have noticed and tried to get a thread going on the subject. Those over the pond as you would say Don poopaad it.
The other thing I find interesting in this thread is the use of a Pinus Pinea. Not many used as Bonsai
I have two though they are not styled as Bunjingi.

Pup

[Bretts]

This is something I have considered as well the left to right being more appealing than the other. It was explained to me as we read left to right a tree that moves in that direction is seen to be progressive. A tree that leans the other way is stalling or going backwards. It is almost one of those things that I wish was never pointed out to me as I am unsure I will ever be able to figure out how much truth there is to it?
The image that I am using as a stencil for my literati is left to right but it sits on my tree right to left which upsets me

This tree reminds me of a tree that won a special award for a certain styling division and stirred some controversy. The experts saw something that the general population could not. It had a bowed head much like yours but then had a worl of branches like an umbrella. Can't find it at the moment I think it was on BT. It would be an interesting comparison.

[Watto]

You could possibly put some movement into the trunk, I will consider that over the next few weeks before deciding on the next step for this tree.
Thanks for your thoughts.

[Jarrod]

Bretts this is the tree you were thinking of I believe!



this tree is owned by Mike Page, no permission was sought to use image.

[Watto]

Jarrod - there is a bit of inspiration, thanks for that.

[FlyBri]

Gday Watto & Co!

When I looked at your Pine very early this AM, I was moved to do a rough virt of where I'd try to take the tree.

Watto_Pine_Bunjin_Sketch.jpg

Please take it with a grain of salt. As I said, it was really early...

Thanks, and good luck in the Contest!

Fly.

[Watto]

Thanks Fly, I'm open to all thoughts and suggestions.

[Watto]

Its been a while since I updated here so I thought I should rectify that tonight.
Originally I selected the pot because the pot colour matched the trunk colour, but now I am looking for some contrast, thus this beautiful dark pot just a bit smaller. I'ts a one off Pat Kennedy drum pot that I purchased for this tree some time ago.
I also thought about a new position in the pot and used a few wedges to see where the new planting angle might look better.
A bit more of an update later.

[Grant Bowie]

Gee I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrose!

Grant

[Handy Mick]

I think we should chop it and carve it next meeting
Mick

[Watto]

I never liked the really straight section of the trunk, and so decided to try and give it some slight movement.
To achieve this I cut a number of small slits in the trunk along the part I wanted to bend, then wrapped it in an elastic self adhesive bandage (used for strapping crook ankles), applied a couple of strands of 8mm wire and gave it a bend. A couple of days later it was back to the original position, so I applied a clamp and left it for a few months.

[Watto]

After removing the clamp, the wire and the bandage I discovered that the bending was only very slight (OK a failure) and as such the whole tree needed a re-think.
Jamie originally suggested that my selected back was his preferred front, and after much turning around I decided to give his idea a go. I cut off my old apex and went with just the back branch. The old branch was jinned, and fire treated (carving, shaping and placement to be done soon) and is now the back jin - as opposed to a back branch. This of course reduced the foliage considerably and has made the look of the tree much lighter.
Over the coming weeks I will wire all the branches that are remaining and place them to create a new apex.

[Jamie]

gday watto

what i think you need is a trunk bender the size of bodhi's! it is a lot bigger than the commercial ones, even if you have to get it fabricated, i reckon it would move that trunk, it will take a good many years to set that trunk being so thick.

your other option is the use of a guy wire, which you could pre drill then screw in a heavy threaded screw, on low on the trunk, one higher on the trunk, the middle of the guy would be where you want the bend, then you can tighten the wire each day. a turn buckle in the middle would do the same thing

virt

virt for watto.jpg

jamie