That's it, but I'll take the comment a bit further, if I may. I think that often people see folks bending big branches on conifers and think that's how it's done on deciduous trees. Heck, I've bent branches as large as my arm on pine trees myself. But deciduous trees are different - branches are grown into place, not bent into place. So the fall cut back is extremely important on deciduous trees. It's a big component of how branch structure is developed on deciduous trees. So cut the heavy branches back to the fine growth and then just wire the stuff thinner than a matchstick, if it needs to be repositioned. Forget about the wire on the thick branches - you're not bending them without breaking them anyway. They don't call them hardwoods for nothing. At the same time, do all the maintenance pruning:
- Prune growth coming out of the bottom of the branches
- Prune growth directed toward the interior of the tree
- Thin branches junctions with multiple shoots and buds down to two branches, preferably horizontal ones.
- For every 2-3 horizontal branches, keep an upward facing shoot
- For each branch, think about the structure - for apically dominant trees, there should be a leader and secondary branches that emerge in an alternating pattern. So leave your leader a little long and prune the side branches back a little harder
Lot's of people wire deciduous trees during dormancy. I tend not to, but if you do, watch out for the wire cutting in. The branches won't set until the tree starts to grow. It grows fast in early spring so that wire might need to come off 2-4 weeks into the growing season. Keep a very close eye on it.
The other thing to watch in early spring is that the foliage can become quite dense, especially if you're pinching the spring shoots (it looks like this tree is pinched). So you'll need to thin the outer canopy - perhaps you'll need to do a partial outer canopy defoliation. The goal is to allow light and air into the interior of the tree. To see how to do this, I'd recommend you sign up for Bjorn's online intermediate course on Bonsai Empire. It goes into all of this in quite a lot of detail.
Most of all have fun. This is a nice tree and tridents will keep you busy. I like that you got in there and wired it - the practice will pay off down the line. Consider taking Colin's wiring class on Craftsy - it's free and an excellent instructional video. Pay particular attention to the parts about anchoring and how to wire two branches with a single piece of wire. And also the parts about the relative stength of two smaller pieces of wire as compared to a single large piece. Actually, it's all good. When you're done, critically evaluate your own wiring and learn from the differences.
Scott
Still enjoyed it though! BTW, yes yes I know, my wiring still sucks
