Styling advice for jujube tree

[justBonsai]

Hi,

A few weeks ago I cut and root pruned a mature jujube tree that was going to be thrown away. Its producing a lot of healthy suckers, but I am unsure of how I want to style and develop the tree. The tree is a very aggressive grower and tends to send out long shoots. The top shoot shown is only about 5-6 days of growth. Fortunately leaf and internode reduction are no issue. I can't really find much information on styling these as bonsai so I was hoping for advice and possibly pictures of potential end products. I have a few pictures below and a mature tree.

*I apologize for the blurry pictures. My auto focus on my phone is partially broken and clear shots are a gamble

Thanks,
Julian

 

[bonhe]

Hi Julian,
I think it is fine to train it as its natural growth!
Bonhe

 

[edprocoat]

Bluemeon, you know that your having just chopped this a "few weeks ago " that this tree should be allowed to recover this year before you do anything else to it? As for styling you need to wait until it grows a few branches first, probably in a few years or so you will be ready to do some styling.

ed

 

[justBonsai]

Bluemeon, you know that your having just chopped this a "few weeks ago " that this tree should be allowed to recover this year before you do anything else to it? As for styling you need to wait until it grows a few branches first, probably in a few years or so you will be ready to do some styling.

ed

I'm more than aware of that. I understand and prioritize horicultural rules over immediate results. Nowhere did I say I was beginning work now and given the current growth there wouldn't be much to "style" to begin with. I'm simply seeking information as to what can I do with this tree and how it can look.

 

[M. Frary]

I would have chopped it a lot lower. It's just a chimney now. Lower and you would be on your way to building taper.

 

[justBonsai]

I would have chopped it a lot lower. It's just a chimney now. Lower and you would be on your way to building taper.

True. The reason I didn't chop lower was that this tree tends to send out very long shoots with little taper. Even with a low chop a smooth transition would take many years and many more for proper barking to form. Much longer than say developing a chopped trident. The transition even when healed over would look very awkward and unnatural. In the next year or two I intend to carve out the top chop to smooth the transition to the first shoot. We'll see how it goes after that.