AusBonsai

My one and only JBP has been virtually dormant for most of winter, even here in QLD. In autumn it was cut back a bit and wired and shortly after it grew what I thought would become candles. But they stayed like this all winter and in the last couple of days finally look like they are doing something. About the same time a number of these buds are growing too now. My question is,- are the older ones candles or buds that went dorment over winter?
Thank you for any light some-one more experienced than I can shed on it.

they are candles starting to open up and extend.

Ken

RB,
some of your recent buds may actually turn out to be flowers - they cluster around the central leader and when fully extended, throw off pollen dust when disturbed. Your pine is looking healthy

Just look like various sized candles to me.
Very small candles don't look a lot like candles at all.
The 3rd picture shows a number of these.

At the end of summer, the JBP will develop buds, which in spring grow into candles, and open up new needles. They are all one in the same thing. Like aforementioned, some of those can be mistaken easily for flowers, depending on how vigorous and healthy the tree is. I can spot a flower or two in your photos.

Thank you all for your replies. Being still a novice I haven't had the experience, this is the first spring for my bonsai trees and I'm excited because they're all going gangbusters.

The way I see it all pine buds are called candles because of the shape so I'd say all of your pictures are of 'candles'
The confusion could be that there are buds/ candles of different strengths on pines. There are also vegetative and flowering buds/candles that each look different. We also occasionally get juvenile growth buds/candles that look even more different.
for all intents and purposes buds/candles on pines can be treated the same except for very weak ones which should not be pruned until they grow and gain strength.