Adair - Thanks for a great thread. Could you speak a little bit to building primary/secondary branches for JBP? Do you use spring or summer candles? How to control their length? How to make them into bud filled branches right where you want them?
If I understand the question, you're asking about how to build ramification right? That's done by decandling, mostly. When we decandle the spring candle, we cut it off. New buds form at the base of where the spring candle was, and grow out. They will be shorter in length. Where the spring candle might have been 4 inches long, the summer candles would probably be only one or one and a half inches long. And instead of one long shoot, we would have two shorter shoots.
Let's say we had a little branch, with two side branches. With a single bud on each. We have a right branch, a left branch and a terminal. We have three buds, 3 candles grow out in the spring. In the summer, we cut them off. Over the summer, new adventitious buds form, and grow. For simplicity, let's say each produces two summer shoots. Now, we have a branch with 6 twigs. Each side branch now has a fork on the end with 2 shoots, and the terminal has two shoots.
Do it again, next year, and there'd be 12.
That's the basic approach. Each year, you double the number of terminal tips on your tree.
This works really well once the tree has been trained to the point you want to begin refinement, or is in the process of being refined, or is a finished tree that is being maintained.
The decandling technique is very reliable if the tree is strong and healthy. That is why it is the preferred method.
Combining decandling and wiring the branch out will expose the older wood to the sun, which encourages the tree to back bud, using old dormant adventitious buds. Unfortunately, we can not rely on this to happen, and if it does, it may not occur where we want them, or rather, where we need them. If we get them, it's a happy occurrence!
Let's speak to that, for a moment: Usually, if we get a back bud on a branch, it usually grows from the top of the base of a V where two horizontal branches are. You remember how we discussed "bud selection" before? Choosing two horizontal buds on JBP? So, now, we have a third bud growing up at the base of the V formed by two other branches. Do you keep it? Or remove it? Probably keep it! Especially if it is back towards the trunk.
In an ideal branch, we would like to have one of these little "top branches" about every third V. (Intersection) When they get big enough, they are wired to follow the main branch they emanated from, and they serve to add height to the branch pad.
At some point, even with annual decandling, every branch will eventually grow too long for the tree. It will need to be cut back. These "Top Branches" are ideal places to cut back to. And then they become the new branch.
Again, this is consistent with the concept we discussed with the deciduous tree technique of using the top bud and bending it down. Here, we cut back to the Top Branch, and wire it down to shorten the overgrown main branch.
It's a constant cycle of growth and cutting back.
Unfortunately, dormant adventitious buds only exist on the old wood where the base of a candle used to be. If in the past, the tree grew very quickly, and had long internodes, there will be long gaps between adventitious buds. While the old wood is still covered with smooth grey bark, you can see where the candle bases used to be. Once the bark starts to get flaky, you can't. Once you learn to recognize the old growth pattern, you can use it to your advantage. Choose a branch that had been grown out more slowly, as it will have had more internodes, and thus is more likely to backbud. One that grew a foot it's first year, won't have any adventitious buds within that foot! Only needle buds.
You can work with needle buds. They're weaker and much less reliable. But if you get one, you can use it.
I'll discuss those next post.
