A big pine

I love the movement in the middle picture, the larger scar can be easily visually reduced and healed over time! Nice material, very powerful base!

River's Edge said:

I love the movement in the middle picture, the larger scar can be easily visually reduced and healed over time! Nice material, very powerful base!

Click to expand...

Right now, that’s my preferred front, assuming that when I reduce the deadwood I don’t have appreciable reverse taper in that section.

Dav4 said:

Right now, that’s my preferred front, assuming that when I reduce the deadwood I don’t have appreciable reverse taper in that section.

Click to expand...

It looks like there are a few options to leave a sacrifice branch in the vicinity a while longer to thicken the area if needed!

This one really takes my breath away... when I move it to take pictures, usually... soooo heavy! It's growing well post re-pot and a big cut back on overlong branches to start pushing the growth in toward the trunk. It'll get fed heavily through the summer and fall to pump it up for more work next year.

Smokin’ base on that puppy. Will be a winner in a few years.

Big, fat, happy… And only getting fatter! With the energy this one is exhibiting the spring, I suspect we will be developing very quickly . Several of the branches were partially wired and pulled down with guy wire. I suspect it will get a pretty hard cut back after the foliage hardens off, along with selective de-candling.

This was cut back and partially de-candled today, maybe a week early but this one is just beginning the refinement phase and I’ve got too many Jbp to work and need to get it done when I can… looking forward to this next phase

Update time for this one. It spent most of last winter outside with the rest of my trees and, truthfully, suffered a bit for it with a fair amount of freeze burned needles. Still, it was strong enough that I felt comfortable D candling all the keeper branches except for the sacrificial ones. It’s putting back nicely.

Dav4 said:

Update time for this one. It spent most of last winter outside with the rest of my trees and, truthfully, suffered a bit for it with a fair amount of freeze burned needles. Still, it was strong enough that I felt comfortable D candling all the keeper branches except for the sacrificial ones. It’s putting back nicely.
View attachment 447011

Click to expand...

Dav4 said:

Update time for this one. It spent most of last winter outside with the rest of my trees and, truthfully, suffered a bit for it with a fair amount of freeze burned needles. Still, it was strong enough that I felt comfortable D candling all the keeper branches except for the sacrificial ones. It’s putting back nicely.
View attachment 447011

Click to expand...

Awesome treee

It's hot today with heat indexes above 100 F. I nearly passed out lifting this one up on the pedestal for the photo. I'm sure the pine thinks I sent it back to GA!

Great trunk, Love bottom rt branch.

Coming together nicely!!!

There's a stout one!



Branches all "aflail" will tame after a few more wire applications. Down by the river aged trunk seems like it grew over "the van"......

I'm always trying to improve the trees on my bench... slowly but surely (and hopefully!) bringing out the best in them. This one had a tentative front picked when it was re-potted over 2 years ago. The base (best part of the tree?) was probably at its strongest and most balanced, and branching was decent. The things that bothered me, though, was that the base tapered very abruptly to the trunk, which didn't have great taper until above the ugly chop scars which sit dead center at eye level. After much deliberation, I decided to rotate the trunk clockwise close to 90 degrees. Good things about the change in front is that there base is still good (not as balanced though), there is good movement AND taper moving from the base and up the trunk and the overall movement of the tree is more defined and dynamic. Also, the chop scar is no longer staring straight out at the viewer. I went ahead with a more aggressive styling based on the new front last week which involved using a hand jack to move the heavy first branch from the back upwards and toward the front.

The offending chop scar front and center before the recent work


Vet wrap and wire applied to assist with the bend and protect the trunk. In hindsight, I wish I had used two loops of wire instead of one because the branch did tear a bit in an unsupported spot but will be fine I suspect.


The jack in action.


A chisel and guy wires were used to assist pulling down some of the heavier upper branches.

There's a piece of charred dead wood happered into the split to keep it open.



Finished. The lower left branch is probably going to get removed in the future...




I will probably perform some root grafts in the future as well.

Look at that base.... pretty awesome tree in a few years

Good news... that primary branch/secondary trunk isn't dead yet

Nice work sir, I agree about removing the front/left low branch.
Although the foliage is in the right place it looks awkward as it leaves the trunk.
Seems like that back left branch should be able to extend and fill the space fairly easily.
Powerful tree!

Mid summer update! It was de-candled 2 weeks ago and big fat buds are beginning to push. I noticed yesterday that the heavy wire used to move the secondary trunk was beginning to cut in, so I decided to remove it allong with the guy wire and vet wrap. It's now fixed in the the new position and the split on the back of the branch will likely callus over and disappear in a few years, thanks to sacrifice branch.

Gonna be a show stopper.

Brian Van Fleet said:

Gonna be a show stopper.

Click to expand...

Only if I live long enough!!!

Honestly, it's got a long way to go before hitting the show circuit, but I'm happy to see it continue to grow well here and respond to the insults that continuously rain down upon it under my care. I have a dream that when the tree is ready, I'll be able to squeeze it into that kowatari era Chinese rectangle on the table.