Big garden centre Mugo projects! Vance should like these... :D

These are four very large Varella - I got the impression they were ungrafted but I might find otherwise with digging. They do seem to be two "pairs" though, two are lighter green and two are bluer....might just be where they were kept at the place I got them from. Safe to say they are "OLD stock".

Initlal plan is to do loads of grafting and maybe air layers, be daft to throw that much material away if I don't have to, each branch is bigger/thicker than any pine I've had to date! Then root reduction in stages...............the main problem is they (even the pots alone...!) are too big to fit through my house at the moment so I have them stashed in someone else's garden!!!!!!!!!!  

I'll try to get grafts going on "every" branch, even if I end up jinning them (most of them I will!) it's not bad practice.

I left it too late this year really but no harm in trying. I might try to graft more dwarf forms on at a later date, see how it goes. There ARE some back buds but they are sparse, tiny, and still a fair way along the branches away from the trunk. I'll probably employ shoot extension / feeding then cutting to a few needles as well to hedge my bets and help the inner buds along.

Me like.  Glad you were able to find trees like these.  I notice you have done some approach grafts.  Good luck with them and let us know how they turn out.

Does the Lable give you any kind of description other than Mugo Pine?  It is always nice to know a bit more specifically what you are dealing with.

They are apparently 'Varella', but the labels are waaaaay faded to nothing so it's word of mouth from the nursery people!

I should have been clearer, I grafted bits to one of them (the last two original photos). I used side grafts, like this one by Brent@Evergreen but with mainly bigger/older (but still very green/fleshy) scions...I might use some of this year's shoots too which I should be able to wrap/bag:

Vance have you ever come across this?!!

My head hurts! http://files.conifertreasury.org/2016/CT%208%200Ny/CT%208%200%202016%20Pinus%20mugo.htm

Keri-WMS wrote:Vance have you ever come across this?!!

My head hurts! http://files.conifertreasury.org/2016/CT%208%200Ny/CT%208%200%202016%20Pinus%20mugo.htm

Thanks for sharing this. I had not seen it. There is a lot of information and a lot of Mugo cultivars I did not know existed.

Vance Wood wrote:

Keri-WMS wrote:Vance have you ever come across this?!!

My head hurts! http://files.conifertreasury.org/2016/CT%208%200Ny/CT%208%200%202016%20Pinus%20mugo.htm

Thanks for sharing this.  I had not seen it.  There is a lot of information and a lot of Mugo cultivars I did not know existed.

No worries, looks like a lot/most of them have been kept by the person that found them and not released to the trade, hard to be sure. I've always wanted to find a witches broom and create my own cultivar (would have to be Scots Pine in the UK)!

Well those scions died - lack of wrap/bag probably....

I grafted more the other week now it's cooler and as I'd been thinning and wiring a far smaller type Mugo, a Pumilio. I just took all the prunings and stripped the tips down to create scions. They are TINY compared to the first attempt of Varrella-onto-Varrella! And this time (a) I wrapped them up in film to keep them damp and (b) the weather is cooling down rather than heating up. The understock are actually pushing a bit at the moment having been moved to a better location with more light and water, so that kind of takes the edge off me grafting at probably the wrong time of year....again....fingers crossed.




Here's the tree/clump I did the initial restyle on that gave me the scions. 4in tall ish, the big ones are more like 4ft tall ish!

Keri-WMS wrote:Vance have you ever come across this?!!

My head hurts! http://files.conifertreasury.org/2016/CT%208%200Ny/CT%208%200%202016%20Pinus%20mugo.htm

I have come accross this list but I have never encountered most of these cultivars.

Hi Keri-WMS

I'm not a "pine guy" so I don't know if this is a viable option but if the scions don't take would it be possible to bend existing branches around to approach graft onto the trunks like you could with most deciduous trees?

The photos suggest that may have quite a few thin potentially bendy branches.

Like I say I've no idea if you can do that with a Mugo pine but I do seem to remember an old post on here where someone approach grafted a whole small tree onto a large pine branch growing in the wild so they could cut the branch off and grow it on the new roots.

I think that was a Mugo but I might have "miss remembered" that

Regards

Richard

Richard S wrote:Hi Keri-WMS

I'm not a "pine guy" so I don't know if this is a viable option but if the scions don't take would it be possible to bend existing branches around to approach graft onto the trunks like you could with most deciduous trees?

The photos suggest that may have quite a few thin potentially bendy branches.

Like I say I've no idea if you can do that with a Mugo pine but I do seem to remember an old post on here where someone approach grafted a whole small tree onto a large pine branch growing in the wild so they could cut the branch off and grow it on the new roots.

I think that was a Mugo but I might have "miss remembered" that

Regards

Richard

Hi Richard - yup you're correct, a lot of the branches are thin enough to bend round, (ranging from roughly finger to broom handle ish).

If the grafts fail and I can't get them to back bud I would probably resort to that. I might be air layering a load of them off too so that might give me a plan...C? D? ...to graft them on that way.

Fingers crossed the scions make it this time though!

I potted the donor mini Mugo by the way, didn't have to disturb many roots so fingers crossed - it's in it's old compost plus a drainage layer for the moment.

This I am going to watch with interest. Where in the UK are you?

East Sussex.

Ok so climate same as me in Kent. Please keep thus post updated.

BrendanR wrote:Ok so climate same as me in Kent. Please keep thus post updated.

Will do! Good news this time I hope..!!

yes... approach grafts would yield better results...

kevin stoeveken wrote:yes... approach grafts would yield better results...

I agree, in as much as there's a better chance of success. On the other hand I only had the one stock plant, and it had just been pruned so nothing to lose by trying!

If this doesn't work I might try the approach method using a bunch of dwarf Mugo starters or even small grafted whips I've done myself if I manage that.

Have you had much success layering these trees?

M. Frary wrote: Have you had much success layering these trees?

I've not tried yet, MOST pines are regarded as a pain and/or very slow, but not impossible. There's a fair bit of info out there about layering JBP so I thought I'd follow their methods and see (JBP and SOME JWP like Zuisho can even grow from cuttings). I have so many branches I can try a load each of ring / partial ring / tourniquet etc and compare the results - nothing's set in stone with trees I've found.

For instance I took some oak cuttings of 2-4y old twigs in late summer or autumn last year (sorry not 100% sure when), stuck them in a cheap propagator on the windowsill of a heated house....they leafed out in the middle of winter and rooted, and grew happily all summer when I moved them outside.......and Oak are supposed to be a no-go for cuttings. So you never know unless you try!

Thinking about it the cuttings were from the tops of 10-15 year old raw material, cuttings from mature Oaks are supposed to be harder.....will have to try that too!

I believe I've read that Mugo can be struck from cuttings.
So maybe a layer isn't out of the question.
If pines could be ground layered reliably we wouldn't need to jump through hoops to get them into good bonsai soil.

M. Frary wrote: If pines could be ground layered reliably we wouldn't need to jump through hoops to get them into good bonsai soil.

I've been looking at nearly everything I've bought from garden centre stock and thinking that same thing recently!

Bit of a risk involved though. If it was 80% successful we'd need to be ready to accept improving 8 trees but at the cost of losing 2 (to pick a percentage). Ok with raw material though!

I've found the multiple layers of circling repeatedly-pot-bound-then-potted up roots are really bad with garden centre pines.

https://ibonsaiclub.forumotion.com/t14413-my-vision-of-an-airlayerd-pinus-mugo-from-2008 < Bingo.

With nursery Mugos it'll be tough to avoid ending with even less of a primary trunk as they tend to be almost multi-trunk....depends how it's done I suppose.

Keri-WMS wrote:https://ibonsaiclub.forumotion.com/t14413-my-vision-of-an-airlayerd-pinus-mugo-from-2008 < Bingo.

With nursery Mugos it'll be tough to avoid ending with even less of a primary trunk as they tend to be
almost multi-trunk....depends how it's done I suppose.

Those trees are Vance Woods bread and butter. It takes a while but can be done. All of his Mugo pines are from nursery stock.

M. Frary wrote:

Keri-WMS wrote:https://ibonsaiclub.forumotion.com/t14413-my-vision-of-an-airlayerd-pinus-mugo-from-2008 < Bingo.

With nursery Mugos it'll be tough to avoid ending with even less of a primary trunk as they tend to be
almost multi-trunk....depends how it's done I suppose.

Those trees are Vance Woods bread and butter. It takes a while but can be done. All of his Mugo pines are from nursery stock.

Yup I've seen his videos etc.

What I was meaning was that if you've got a tree with 2" from rootball to first branch/2nd trunk, you will halve that by the time you've layered it. So it depends on the material, in my case all my branches are like 1.5ft long and boring so there's loads of room for the layering!