Air layer super old juniper HELP

[Schmikah]

It might have something to do with the fact that ERC are considered to be some of the hardest junipers to do bonsai with in general. They go juvenile whenever there's a little stress and they seem to be very susceptible to apple cedar rust. Most people think ERC isn't worth the trouble.
There are some cultivars though, that seem to lack the juvenile finnickyness.

I have quite a few varieties of junipers, and in general they root pretty well from layers. But it might depend on who you ask and what their baseline for 'easy rooting' is. Most herbs take less than 21 days, most fruiting trees, like cherries and apples, can take three months. Waiting an entire spring and summer and possibly fall, might seem long to those people.

That's fair. I heard up to 2 years sometimes but that might be without rooting hormone and/or moss as the medium. I'll have to ask around next club meeting to get more specifics. It could be the difference in weather (maybe). I know you guys are rainy but relatively cold, where we are rainy/humid and HOT.

I'm probably going to experiment on a 'grey owl' ERC cultivar in the next two or three years to see how it does. There's a nice sacrificial branch that, once it helps fatten up the trunk, is gonna be an attempted air layer. Maybe I'll have some different anecdotal evidence then .

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

The grey owl cultivar was the one I was looking for, that should be the least sensitive one when it comes to going juvenile. I'm getting one too next year.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

@Tulsabonsigh
There are a couple species of Juniper native to your area. Your tree looks like it might be Juniperus virginiana, eastern red cedar, or ERC in BNut speak. BUt as time permits, get this juniper identified to specific species. You might be lucky, it might not be ERC.

ERC has a piss poor track record as bonsai. There are a small handful of good ERC bonsai out there, search for Vance Hanna's posts of his here on BNut. But this small sample of good ones, belies that fact that thousands of us have tried to work with ERC and gave up in frustration. Wasting years of time and space.

You do have one advantage. An air layer from a 100 year old tree will be genetically 100 years old in terms of maturity. It will develop mature, scale foliage more easily than a young seedling. So if the tree is important for sentimental or personal reasons, by all means do give it a try. You might make the #3 or #4 best ERC bonsai in the USA. I'm not being sarcastic. There are literally only a couple ERC that are worth a second look. But, because they are there does not mean you can't be the one who creates the next great one. It could work. Also, if you tree is NOT ERC, then you definitely have a better chance at creating a good bonsai.

@Wires_Guy_wires - The cultivar 'Grey Owl' is usually listed as J. virginiana, but there are a number of people who feel it is actually a hybrid. The fact that it behaves more like J. chinensis than ERC suggests that the other parent is either J. chinensis or J. sabina, or some other more "domestic" juniper. Where the cultivar was discovered, it was a volunteer seedling in the landscape (fence row?) of a commercial landscape nursery that had many different junipers in cultivation. So the game of "who's your daddy?" comes into play here. The fact that it submits to bonsai cultivation with some success, suggests it is not "pure" J. virginiana. But until genotyping becomes cheap enough, nobody is going to bother with the DNA to sort it out.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

@Wires_Guy_wires - The cultivar 'Grey Owl' is usually listed as J. virginiana, but there are a number of people who feel it is actually a hybrid. The fact that it behaves more like J. chinensis than ERC suggests that the other parent is either J. chinensis or J. sabina, or some other more "domestic" juniper. Where the cultivar was discovered, it was a volunteer seedling in the landscape (fence row?) of a commercial landscape nursery that had many different junipers in cultivation. So the game of "who's your daddy?" comes into play here. The fact that it submits to bonsai cultivation with some success, suggests it is not "pure" J. virginiana. But until genotyping becomes cheap enough, nobody is going to bother with the DNA to sort it out.

Cool info, thanks!

I'm planning on doing some at home DNA extractions this summer and send them out to be sequenced. But I'm considering buying a MinION mk1b. With a kit like that, crude sequencing (13% error margins) can be done pretty cheap. If I ever get to the point of buying and using one, I'll let the forum know. The total costs should be lower than 50 USD per sample, excluding the labor of course.

 

[Tulsabonsigh]

@Tulsabonsigh
There are a couple species of Juniper native to your area. Your tree looks like it might be Juniperus virginiana, eastern red cedar, or ERC in BNut speak. BUt as time permits, get this juniper identified to specific species. You might be lucky, it might not be ERC.

ERC has a piss poor track record as bonsai. There are a small handful of good ERC bonsai out there, search for Vance Hanna's posts of his here on BNut. But this small sample of good ones, belies that fact that thousands of us have tried to work with ERC and gave up in frustration. Wasting years of time and space.

You do have one advantage. An air layer from a 100 year old tree will be genetically 100 years old in terms of maturity. It will develop mature, scale foliage more easily than a young seedling. So if the tree is important for sentimental or personal reasons, by all means do give it a try. You might make the #3 or #4 best ERC bonsai in the USA. I'm not being sarcastic. There are literally only a couple ERC that are worth a second look. But, because they are there does not mean you can't be the one who creates the next great one. It could work. Also, if you tree is NOT ERC, then you definitely have a better chance at creating a good bonsai.

@Wires_Guy_wires - The cultivar 'Grey Owl' is usually listed as J. virginiana, but there are a number of people who feel it is actually a hybrid. The fact that it behaves more like J. chinensis than ERC suggests that the other parent is either J. chinensis or J. sabina, or some other more "domestic" juniper. Where the cultivar was discovered, it was a volunteer seedling in the landscape (fence row?) of a commercial landscape nursery that had many different junipers in cultivation. So the game of "who's your daddy?" comes into play here. The fact that it submits to bonsai cultivation with some success, suggests it is not "pure" J. virginiana. But until genotyping becomes cheap enough, nobody is going to bother with the DNA to sort it out.

my current ERC I think it has some potential, unique trunk and lots of taper

 

[B.uneasy]

I personally understand where you're coming from. No matter how many times you hear, "Buy some starter material", or "Dig up an accessible piece of material", an air layer from this tree will be more symbolic to you. Good luck getting up there, don't do anything to risk your safety! I've got so many projects like this, from trees that actually mean something to me.