Funky dougy

wireme

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I collected this tree mainly for the nice bark on the lower trunk. I love the thick bark that Doug fir develop. The upper section of trunk above the jinn was very straight so I started putting a bend in it last year and also bent the first branch back over the trunk. I think it's off to a good start, looking forward to the future of this tree. It was collected three years ago, spent 2 years in a grow bed and is its first year in a pot.
Mpimage.jpgimage.jpgimage.jpg
 

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It's about 18" from the pot rim to the uppermost foliage. The current plan is to let it grow freely again next year to thicken the upper trunk and branches, prune for back budding the following year, grow out again and it should be prime to work on after that. I will also continue to increase the main trunk bend during this time as well.
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Got repotted again today unfortunately, still too early to repot Doug fir here but..

I just got it out of the mulch bed yesterday morning. I sat with my morning coffee checking the tree out with it sitting on a turntable in top of a cardboard box. Not too clever I know but I generally get smarter as the day progresses and this was early morning still. During the day the soil in the pot thawed, water ran down to the box, it gave away and tumbled down a covered staircase. I found it there this morning battered and bruised with roots in the air. Whoops.

It may do fine, pretty hard to predict, one main root stripped of bark pretty good from the wire tying it into the pot. Moist cold day yesterday luckily.

I thought I'd show a pic in the new pot while it's still green, hope it stays green!

Also my new ground/soil cover, probably will use with most conifers this year. Larch needles, they kind of mesh together nicely not washing away easily at varying thicknesses, provide good shade and slow drying of the top layer of soil. It doesn't take much water to penetrate the layer and they look pretty nice too.
 

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I can tell from the tense silence there's much concern for this poor tree. It is still green and growing, appears just fine, go figure eh? Maybe the fact that it still has a large core of mountain soil helped it survive its day and night out of the pot.
 

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wireme

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The tree actually did quite well this year, lots of healthy back budding. I decided its time to pick a front and make a plan for pruning locations next spring. I did some gentle manipulating with guy wires, took a few pics and I think I've got a nice tree in the works. I decided on the opposite side of the pics taken earlier this year for the front. Second pic is cropped in to show the portion of tree I plan on using/developing. Third shot shows some of the backbudding action, should fill in pretty quickly now. Probably I will take a couple years to prune it down, a repot in there sometime so maybe a full styling in 3-4 years time.
 

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Nice recovery. I bet that was stressful.
In the last two weeks I have lost the top branches on two of my older trees. One couldn't have been helped (squirrel or bird, but a break and no teeth marks) and the other one was an overly ambitious wiring mishap.
But one thing is for sure, you have to roll with the punches and it looks like your Dougy will be ok.
 

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Yeah, it's annoying eh? I lost a couple key parts to trees this spring with snowmelt. Sometimes it seems like there are so many potential setbacks that I wonder how we can ever get a tree to a finished or developed state. I actually haven't got one there yet!

Lucky with this one though. No ill effects, just a delay in removal of mountain soil and planting into a smaller pot.
 

sorce

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Wireme.

The base looks way fatter in the new angle.
Was it potted higher? Or just the angle change?

Definitely a good looking front.

I like this one!

Sorce
 

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Delayed response sorce, sorry! Yeah just camera angles to show the base better and a bit of extra substrate raked back I guess.

A few shots around the horn of the tree today, getting very close to being ready for a nice satisfying styling I think. Probably will repot next spring hopefully to a reasonable sized container.
 

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wireme

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I set some of the pics in order to check out from similar angles, obviously still a ways to go but I figure it's not bad progress so far no?image.jpgimage.jpgimage.jpgimage.jpg
 

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This one also got a repot, got rid of all the mountain soil finally, still too much taproot (shortened by a third or so this time) to fit a smaller pot, maybe next time. Partway through root cleaning...image.jpg
I'm quite certain now that this is the front. image.jpgAnd this section I think holds the future of the tree. image.jpg Up till now it's been about growing that bent back twig into a trunk. I will soon cut a lot of it off and use these buds for crown, branch, whatever..,
Even the right branch has a twig below, it will take a bit longer but I'll probably use that instead and jinn that branch.
That's the rough plan, should work out.
 

sorce

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aviary-image-1461716042141.jpeg

I really like what I consider the "funky", the turns in this Dougy.

If you carry that look out into the branching, I think this will be very interesting.

Can't really say it "cool".

The stuff you do touches my soul different then any others.

It's almost like you use the same model lense as I do to look into the future.

Hell....that is cool!

Thanks for Nutting!

Sorce
 

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View attachment 102974

I really like what I consider the "funky", the turns in this Dougy.

If you carry that look out into the branching, I think this will be very interesting.

Can't really say it "cool".

The stuff you do touches my soul different then any others.

It's almost like you use the same model lense as I do to look into the future.

Hell....that is cool!

Thanks for Nutting!

Sorce

Yeah, that's cool!

We probably do have the same lenses. Mine are kinda blurry for sure but everything looks much better through them.
 

wireme

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More winter dreaming.

A pic from summertime to play with. image.jpg
Simple erasing to an outline, this more or less is option one, something along these lines. image.jpg

And this is the other idea, more often I figure I'll go the route above but this is sometimes hard to let go of. The iPhone scribble virt is probably much tamer than reality would be. And this design may work better with the other side as front. image.jpgimage.jpg

Options 3 through 26 have been erased from memory and hopefully will stay gone.
 
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