When I grow up I wanna join the ranks of Alpine's Bad Boyz

[Inspired]

I often read and admire Alpine's work including his bad ass yamadori Juni

Just potted this Juni up today and I am very happy with the potential in this material

Will now just be giving it TLC and let it grow for a number of years with light work here and there.

Any virt artisists here that can assist with direction?

[Phoenix238]

"Bad boyz bad boyz, what you gonna prune? What you gonna prune when they re-pot you?"

Lots of potential there, wouldn't even know where to start myself. Would have thought removing that much foliage would be dangerous though?

[Inspired]

LOL thanks Phoenix.. just like you sang this one aspires to be a bad ass some day and must walk the walk

I have no issues to date working Juni's as I am comfortable with them. My lesson from the only Juni casualty years back was when I bare rooted one to spray it down

I don't hose them after that

[NAHamilton]

A lot of what I've read and seen (online) leads me to believe you can't prune a Juniper that hard. Have you cut them back this much previously?

[BonsaiElmo]

Advice I've gotten is you can do almost anything to either the tree, or the roots, but just not both at the same time.

So heavy prune and shape top half one year, then root prune and repot the following year. Or vice versa.

I heavily pruned and wired a handful of junipers a few months back, without disturbing the roots, and they are powering along now. Will look at repotting them next year.

[kez]

Much as I hope I'm wrong, I don't think this one will be with you for much longer. Junipers get their strength from the foliage, of which you have left none. If this tree has also just been collected, that's another step towards its demise.

I hope I'm wrong, but I know alpine lost a few of his, with a lot more left on top

Best of luck and keep us posted

Kerrin

[Inspired]

Cheers guys the roots were fibrous and am confident in this bad boy wanna be

Extra TLC, rehab with training and he will soon be well on his way to joining Alpine's elite

I brushed the trunk and boi did I get excited seeing eye popping roid veins and that reddish bark to work with in future

[Josh]

Will be interesting to see if this one pulls through. Please keep us updated to its progress. Personally I think it may have been worked too hard but you just never know. What is your after care plan for it?

[Andrew Legg]

I'll wait till it lives before spending time doing a virt!!!! May The Force be with ya!

[gerald randall]

I have a natural affinity with broad leaved trees. So it took me a while to understand pines and junipers. I now have many. My first reaction when I looked at the tree was that the branches are cut back too much. my thinking was at two levels, it is nice to have branches to style, graft, etc and then secondly, as junipers need foliage to create new foliage. Not sure what sub species your's is, but up until last year I killed a tree from cutting back too hard, both on top and bottom. Tried to be too smart with my ambitions. With a lot of after care one survived, the other one died.

The latter comment should give you more hope. All the leaves went brown and I thought it was a gonner, but it recovered after a lot of humidity and moderate temperatures.

[Rory]

Yeah, I hate to say it Inspired, but any time I have pruned a conifer even close to as much as you have, I would lose them. It is a safe rule of thumb to say that when you prune a conifer, try not to take off more than 50% of foliage. This one wont be able to generate enough energy without the foliage. I obviously hope it survives for you, but I wouldn't do this again if I were you.

[mtarros]

Yea I don't like your chances of this pulling through and if it does pull through its going to sulk for a while.

Not sure if this will work but i would try and add as many approach grafts to make the branching.

[alpineart]

Hi Inspired , When i grow up i will join the ranks also , twisted and contorted , I'm well on the way I'm but not dead yet . It takes time to reduce the foliage on collected pines and junipers , I have literally killed hundreds if not thousands of them over time just being Me.

I have learnt a lot of valuable lessons and gathered some good info along the way and I dont repeat the failures too often these day . Win or loose you can join the ranks as I have plenty of collected unique dead trunks laying around to use a Phoenix Grafts .

In order to save some of the trunks I tried inarch grafts but too no avail . I still push my material to the limit and beyond and the tip runs are still happening however there is less to take each time .Best of luck with this one .

Cheers . Alpine

[Inspired]

Hey guys thanks for your interest and support.. its encouraging.

I will report back on how this tree goes. This Juni was chopped back to bare stubs in early spring after which new shoots has emerged. Interesting hey.

It was then lifted, root pruned and potted up (yes I understand many will cringe at that).

Aftercare is paramount for me and I watch it closely each day. As it has some foliage, i also ensure evening/night misting as the pores of the needles open up at night time (so I read) which will help with humidity and intake of H20.

[alpineart]

Hi Inspired , mate most of those big mothers had new shoots up to 150mm long then just dropped dead . Mind you they were coping with some very extreme heat , they too were misted at night .

All the best .

Cheers . Alpine