First Posting - Another Scots Pine

Hello to evryone on IBC.

I have been visiting IBC for quite sometime now but never posted before, so here goes.

There seems to have been a number of Scots pine posted over the last few day. Here is my attempt at a literati Scots pine. Still some way to go with the foliage pads and the photo seems to make that more slender area of the trunk, just above the first left branch, more pronounced.

I struggled a bit to get the picture to load so I hope it works.

Hi Alan . How long have you been working on this tree? Its well balanced. It has good movement and is placed well in the pot. Two pointers for you. The bottom branch, in my opinion is too heavy and could possibly be turned into a dead branch[ jin]. the jin on the other side doesnt repeat the downward slope of the other branches.

My thoughts as well. You may want to think about losing the low branch. It looks "contrived".

Neil

I agree with Will's comments, spot on. I would center the tree a bit more during a future repotting.

I'm totally enjoying the wealth of Scots pines on the board. To think I spent the first five years of my recent bonsai life without any pines!

You have a nice tree; should progress nicely over the next few years. You can create all of the foliage pads you'll need without that first branch.

Hi. Ditch the lower branch.
That's my opinion.

100% in agreement with everyone lose the 1st branch it ruins the line and is as thick as trunk - nice tree though.

You might want to consider leaving the long lower branch on the tree until the upper pads have developed more? I also like Will's idea of making it a dead branch..... as it will add to the story but shouldn't take away from the total image (IMHO).
V. nice tree.
Cheers Graham

By removing the lower branch you'll redirect energy into the upper parts of the tree. I'd shorten and jin it now, if it were mine.

It should make a really nice literati in a few years

Hi,
Just a quick virtual for your consideration.
I centered the tree in the pot a little, added a jin and developed the foliage pads.


Kev is correct when he says,

you'll redirect energy into the upper parts of the tree.

In the short term, you'll have a good literati pine. If not a little cookie cutter.
I feel your tree could be developed into a fine literati pine, if you consider developing the dropped left branch as the main feature of this tree and you are prepared to spend longer in development, a lot longer.
With time and craft, with the refinement of the drop branch, (it appears to loop /arch off the trunk). Once this is corrected and with improved and refine the movement and structure of the drop branch, I see a great future for your little pine.

Thanks for all the replys.

Will, I acquired the tree as raw material towards the end of 2004 and apart from removing a bar branch oposite the first left branch I just put it into a plastic pot. There it remained until late in 2006 when I started to style it. So I have been working on it for the past 3 years.

Apart from Jeremy's point of view there is clearly a general concensus that the first branch shoud go. I have considered this on many occasions and will have to think about it more.

Jeremy, I take you mean I should try to get the branch to fall much closer to the trunk at a sharper angle so to speak?

Alan

[quote="Kev Bailey"]By removing the lower branch you'll redirect energy into the upper parts of the tree. I'd shorten and jin it now, if it were mine.

This might be true Kev, but then you've also removed about 20% of the trees power of "Photosynthesis". I agree with the concept but if it were mine I'd wait until its a littel more robust.
Cheers G

[quote="gman"]

Kev Bailey wrote:
(...) ... you've also removed about 20% of the trees power of "Photosynthesis". I agree with the concept but if it were mine I'd wait until its a littel more robust.
Cheers G

I'd say that :
- if there is is enough root space for a season and that the roots can be left untouched until Autumn 2010 ;
- cutting back hard won't be a problem in my opinion : I'd feed it with high N fertilizer for 2-3 weeks, then cut it hard in early-mid november :

With a pine that is well established and appearing as healthy as this one does, removing 50% of the photosynthesising foliage is not a problem. I did this at Burrs with a cascade pine of mine two years ago and it is doing fine.

In fact I've seen trees lose more than 95% of their foliage and thrive. These were tall trees lopped by chainsaws on forestry land, accidentally leaving the lowest branch. So losing 20% now would not harm the tree, assuming nothing else is done for a while.

I agree with Jeremy that a very attractive hanging branch style tree could eventually be developed, but extreme care would have to be exercised not to allow that branch thicken any more. I would argue the cookie cutter part if it were removed though. If it were to be treated as a literati, the whole point is individual character and that would be achieved through improving the movement in the trunk by heavy wiring and detail wiring the foliage pads, eventually, in a denser and more pleasing arrangement.

This pine has excelent colour and plump needles. Good indicators for a very strong and well fed tree. I would have no hesitation in removing the bottom branch and turning it into a jin. If you dont like the jin in the future, you can always take it off. Because this tree is relatively young, I would feed and water it well next spring and summer[ dont worry about needle size ] and then prune most if not all of that years candles off. I have found the best time to do this is the end of July. By August you will notice buds have popped everywhere. You cant do this every year though as needles only last for three years.

This year with both of my Scots pines I allowed the candles to extend out fully, so allowing the trees to gain the maximum benefit of all the needles for the growing season. On this particular tree there has been two gains. Firstly the much improved vigour and secondly, the additional lenth in the branches gave me much more scope to improve the styling.

Thanks for the advice Will re the back-budding. I will follow your advice to improve the foliage pad density.

As for that left branch, I personally like it as I think it does add to tree, but I accept there are problems to overcome such as the thickness of the branch and the branch's angle/shape at the top. I will persist with it for a while longer yet as I can always jin it or cut it off at a later date.

And that is probably the best option. It's your tree, so you have to live with the final decision. In a few years it may become obvious that you have to remove it. But if you can keep the low branch from thickening, it could become a major plus for the tree. Its vigour must be carefully controlled with timely needle plucking and candle removal. A sacrifice branch higher on the tree would help the upper trunk to thicken and eventually improve the balance.