After letting the tree gain strength for about a year and a half, the moment of truth had come. It was clear that the tree had no future with its conflicting "slingshot" double trunk lines. I had thought about eliminating a trunk out of hand, but someone suggested cutting it in two, and the more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea.
Here it was as of this morning. Much stronger.
Laying out the cut lines. I was going to gouge out a vein first, but the bark was too hard and difficult to work with. I wouldn't have been able to follow it exactly with the saw, anyway.
The cut as completed. I broke the bottom 1/4 in half by hand - hoping the split would run along natural fault lines.
Here are the two pieces.
The final two halves, potted up and ready to rest. I will treat them as freshly collected junipers, though to be honest each half had a lot of fine roots left. I will wait until the end of the summer and start looking at final designs for them in the interim.