Brian Van Fleet
Pretty Fly for a Bonsai Guy
Seems awfully severe to defoliate twice in a season. I prefer to keep my trees strong. I stopped fully defoliating my JM a few years ago, and will do a 50% defoliation; removing one of each pair of leaves. This is to allow more sunlight into the tree, and doesn't do anything for twigginess. To develop short internodes, which leads to twigginess, I simply pluck out the growing tip in the spring when the first pair of leaves is distinguishable. This halts the lengthening of the internodes.