Tim's JBP Thread

[TimIAm]

Until now I've been posting in R3's Pine Project thread and think it's time that I stop posting over his excellent work and start my updates in a new space.

This is definitely a learners attempt at growing pines. But, I'm hoping through my ignorance others will learn as I do and maybe in 5 years time I won't have killed every single one of these trees.

Where I started: 6 month old seedlings

I got these mid-April. Unfortunately they were way overcrowded and I had to do an emergency repot. You can see about a third of the bottom has died off due to lack of sunlight.

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At the same time I did some root work as they all needed to be moved, I thought that they were being disturbed anyway. Come spring, I was lucky with the first round of spring growth almost every one of them budded at the lowest point even though needles were already dead.

1 year old seedlings:

At the beginning of Spring, I was happy that the majority of the seedlings had survived. I lost about 10 out of approximately 140 due to repotting. I thought they may have enough space until the next repotting window but I'm getting worried this may not be the case. They have already put on considerable Spring growth and some of them already have another round of green appearing at the head, so I guess over the next couple of weeks there is more growth coming (assumption)? I'm concerned that I may have underestimated the growth and they may be back in the situation where they are again overcrowded.

I'm not just concerned about crowding at the top, but if they are growing really well, the tray may be too shallow?


My question: Looking at the pictures below, when do you suggest I repot?

I'm thinking the options are:
- Now, it's not too late
- In Autumn, it's already too late and Autumn is fine in Sydney, Australia to repot JBP
- They are not overcrowded yet; Spring next year?

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[shibui]

All 3 of your options are good.
JBP seedlings are resilient, even at 1 year old they can cope with root pruning almost all year round so it is not too late this year.
Autumn seems to be a good time to repot any JBP so the seedlings can be done then too.
there's still plenty of space for those to grow for another year but I suspect they would grow a bit faster if they each had more space or a separate pot. If you leave them together, make sure you feed regularly as they will be competing for limited nutrients.
The tray is only too shallow if you can't water enough to keep them happy.

[TimIAm]

With the goal of developing the lowest growth and having a sacrifice up top, when I have growth like the examples below, should I cut so there is only one leader? Is the best time to do this now or at the end of the growing season?

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I also need help understanding some of the terminology, I've watched several videos and tried search but still not sure I understand correctly:

1. Is what I'm asking about above, are they candles?

2. At the beginning of spring, I had one round of growth, which was about 2 inches on each of the seedlings, now the seedlings have had another round of growth where most of them have put out these long straight extensions (candles?). Is this what people refer to when they talk about "flush" with pines?

[TimIAm]

18 month update

I wanted to post regular updates with the trees and mark each update against a picture. I found it a bit tricky with the 5 year contest on Bnut to count months against when the seed first sprouted to try and work out an exact age against the pictures that were posted.

Although these trees are 18 months and look a reasonable size, they were quite crowded and shaded when I got them. I'm mentioning this as I think someone in Sydney could get better results if the seedlings were better spaced and had more access to sunlight during the first Summer growing period.

I did separate these out into individual pots and I'm glad I did because they have really thrown out a lot of roots. Most of these now have roots out through the bottom of the pots. Weeds are a bit of a pain and every 8 weeks or so I need to do weeding on 100+ trees which takes a while.

I have already applied wire and some low bends to a handful of trees that were starting to thicken up.

I planted 3 trees in taller, slender pots in an attempt to do exposed root style.

Next steps after winter growth will be to wire all of the trees for low movement. Each of these trees has had 2 rounds of root work, there was initial root work when I purchased them and secondary root work when I moved them out of the Anderson flats into individual pots. About three of the trees didn't settle into their pots and died during the last 6 months. Although they didn't make it, the root spread on these trees was great, a good sign for the rest of the trees.

All of the trees have good low budding options. Not sure if I just got lucky, but almost every tree had lost their needles for the bottom 30% due to initial lack of sunlight, but all of the trees still put out new buds at the lowest points when they were later exposed to sunlight and they are all looking green and healthy.

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Below is a picture representing what one of the average trees looks like at 18 months:

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