And another juniper, San Jose this time.....

[Drewski]

I found this at a nearby nursery and I really liked the movement of the trunk. I was bemoaning the topiary hairdo, but upon closer examination I spotted some back budding. You can see it in three spots in the picture. There’s one that’s in the crotch of a branch, but the other two are coming out of the trunk. This gave me enough hope that I bought it. My plan is to, once I’ve got some vigorous growth, prune it back to encourage more back budding. I know I can’t keep the branches as they are, but with some (or a lot ) of luck, some of the branches might develop foliage closer in to the trunk. If the back budding doesn’t pay off, then I can always look into grafting some shinpaku on to the trunk and building the tree that way. It’s going to be a long road, but I’ll have fun with the process and continue to learn along the way.

Any thoughts? Suggestions? Warnings?

 

[Bonsai Nut]

The challenge you have with San Jose is going to be the needle foliage. If you can establish the structure, and reduce your pruning as much as possible, you may be able to get it to change to adult scale foliage. But it is difficult, and there is no guarantee that it won't revert back. Since you can sometimes find old San Jose bushes in landscape, I know of folks who would get a chunky San Jose bush and graft shimpaku branches on it to address the foliage issue.

 

[Drewski]

@Bonsai Nut, it’s got a smattering of scale foliage, but is mostly the needle foliage. Probably due to the buzz cuts it got to maintain the topiary styling. So that is definitely going to be a challenge down the road. Although, the needle foliage seems very similar to that of a Procumbens, so maybe I won’t mind it so much.

 

[sorce]

Trunks real nice, certainly worth making a nice frame fer.

Sorce

 

[Bonsai Nut]

@Bonsai Nut, it’s got a smattering of scale foliage, but is mostly the needle foliage. Probably due to the buzz cuts it got to maintain the topiary styling. So that is definitely going to be a challenge down the road. Although, the needle foliage seems very similar to that of a Procumbens, so maybe I won’t mind it so much.

Yeah you just need to know what you're getting into.

What gets frustrating is when they are 50% scale and 50% needle... and you can't get them to make up their mind. It's like playing a game of foliage wack-a-mole. You push back the needle foliage on one section, and it pops out somewhere else

 

[Drewski]

Trunks real nice, certainly worth making a nice frame fer.

Sorce

It might even need a nice pot one day.....

Do you know a guy?

 

[Drewski]

At a different nursery, but they had a few more of the San Jose topiaries. Looked them over and fell in love with the trunk on this one. Same plan as the first one.

 

[keri-wms]

I find they are easily grafted with Itoigawa, basis side-grafts, no need to mess about with approach grafts etc...