styling advise please...

Greetings. This is a $5.00 juniper I got last fall from a local nursery.
I took off probably 1/2 of what you see as the top when I bought it.
It was re potted in early March this year when I removed about 1/2 of the roots.
I'm open to any advise you all could pass on. There are crossing branches, and way too much foliage I know, but I didn't know how much further I should go at this point. The tree seems very healthy, and is covered in fresh growth.
Thanks in advance for your ideas.

I think all I'd do at this point is thin the foliage on top and (MAYBE) shorten some of the branches.

I'd leave it as is and let it recoup from what you've done so far this year; spend some time cleaning out the dead and weak from the interior. Take this time to really see how well the tree responds to the work and plan out for what you envision for the design. Don't worry about shaping, bending, wiring, etc., since it has been through enough; let it get strong, feed and water it well and work out a plan for next year.

It's a very nice piece of material, good luck with it and keep us posted on the progress.

I think the advice to just let it recover is good, but a some point you will want to end up with one trunk instead of two.

Billy M. Rhodes wrote:I think the advice to just let it recover is good, but a some point you will want to end up with one trunk instead of two.

Why?

JimLewis wrote:

Billy M. Rhodes wrote:I think the advice to just let it recover is good, but a some point you will want to end up with one trunk instead of two.

Why?

Two trunks confuse the eye, I don't know which to look at. You also will likely get two one sided trees.

Well, with a change in planting angle and after shortening one and shaping both, I think this could be a very nice composition. No sense in eliminating options until you've studied the tree/pair from every angle.

I think that precisely because it might end up as two one-sided trees is reason not to remove one. I would try to treat it as a twin trunk and see where it takes you. I would thin the canopy of dead and weak foliage and allow it to regenerate over the next year. For $5, a very good find.

Thanks so much everyone.
My intention is to keep them as two trees together unless I see that, that absolutely doesn't work.
I'm still open to ideas, and again, thank you all.
I'll update as it changes.

hi,
with a simple tilt to the right both trunks can be made to work together. The future for the tree is much narrower though, with lots of branch reduction to be done, so i'd consider a narrower pot as this one is huge. (it will be more stressfull to the tree to grow a large new rootpad then have to cut it all off again)



this is very achievable just with wiring - the entire tree was tilted 30 deg and the branches placed where they look good

cheers Marcus

I like Marcus' virt design.