AusBonsai

Thanks Shibui for the explanations and for posting these photos. It helps explain a lot of unanswered questions. I will go and look at my pines again now, I held off cutting for a few days as I have injured my back and need some recuperation time, need to be more careful with our lifting techniques as we get older. miyagiman.

Did another one today mid to large, canberra, about 1-2 weeks later than I usually do for some testing

anyone started cutting candles in perth yet? from my understanding we usually start this a bit later then the east....

I did my two earlier in December - the larger, fairly established one almost 4 weeks ago and the 'finished' parts of the smaller one about a week and a half ago.

This is my first real season knowing what I'm doing with JBP so we'll see how the second flush looks by March. Hopefully didn't blink too early.

Hi Guys,

Just a quick question for shibu, what is the age of the first tree in your example?
At what age (on average) do you start controlling the growth via decandling etc

Regards

Daniel

Hi Shibui,

Thank you for a very concise illustration.

Regards.

I am confused with needle plucking black pines so hopefully you can clear the fog. At what age do you start doing this? I'm assuming that with young trees, say under 5 years old that the idea is to let it grow so that you get a reasonable trunk girth, leave a few well placed branches and then start to ramify when you are happy with the trunk. Is this essentially correct?

Just a quick question for shibu, what is the age of the first tree in your example?

I think the younger tree is probably around 4-5 years old???? (I have too many trees to keep accurate records of them all). Development really depends on how you grow them. i have had JBPs that were left in 10cm pots for 5 years or more and still looked like 2 year olds. Another that has been well kept can grow much bigger in a couple of years.

At what age (on average) do you start controlling the growth via decandling etc

There is no useful answer to this. It is like asking how long is a piece of string.
I think it is more useful to try to think in terms of 'development' rather than age. This probably applies to all species and all aspects of bonsai culture.
Start controlling growth when the trunk has almost reached the desired proportions. For a shohin sized tree this could be from year 2 or 3. For a larger sized tree it may be year 5+, possibly even 10+ or more and depends very much on how the tree has been cared for (see above).
The most important aspect with pines is never let the trunk or branches develop bare sections so you cannot just let them grow freely for more than 3 years at a time.

I am confused with needle plucking black pines so hopefully you can clear the fog. At what age do you start doing this? I'm assuming that with young trees, say under 5 years old that the idea is to let it grow so that you get a reasonable trunk girth, leave a few well placed branches and then start to ramify when you are happy with the trunk. Is this essentially correct?

I think you are on the right track Ed. Just beware of allowing them to develop bare sections of branch with no needles. Always cut back before the oldest needles drop.
The way I understand it, needle thinning is just to try to equalise the vigour of all areas of the tree so that lower branches and inner buds are just as strong (weak?) as the upper ones. Even during the development phase you may find the lower branches looking weaker and hardly growing. That means it is time to slow the stronger areas and promote the weaker areas but during development that can usually be achieved by selective pruning.

thanks for that shibu it clears up some important points!