How do you wire flakey bark?

[cishepard]

I have two old Shore pines with long branches that need wiring. The bark is very flaky and loose, and when I tried some wire last year, I had a hard time not damaging the bark.
Is it best to use raffia under all the wire (or self adhesive rubber tape? or vet wrap?)?
Does wrapping keep the bark too moist? Is it ok to have every branch wrapped? Do you wire more loosely than usual?
Also, when I un-wired the branches recently, as some pieces of bark came off, I used thin CA glue to stick them back on and squirted a bit in spots where bark was loose. Is there any drawback to this? I can see using a lot more to make sure loose bark does not get knocked off in the future.
Please share your techniques for wiring thick, flakey or corkbark trees.

 

[River's Edge]

I have two old Shore pines with long branches that need wiring. The bark is very flaky and loose, and when I tried some wire last year, I had a hard time not damaging the bark.
Is it best to use raffia under all the wire (or self adhesive rubber tape? or vet wrap?)?
Does wrapping keep the bark too moist? Is it ok to have every branch wrapped? Do you wire more loosely than usual?
Also, when I un-wired the branches recently, as some pieces of bark came off, I used thin CA glue to stick them back on and squirted a bit in spots where bark was loose. Is there any drawback to this? I can see using a lot more to make sure loose bark does not get knocked off in the future.
Please share your techniques for wiring thick, flakey or corkbark trees.

I think the response varies on the age and condition of the bark. if the tree is very old and the bark an exceptional characteristics of the Tree than I consider wiring by tie downs rather than wrapping the bench or trunk. If the branch or trunk is young then I do not concern myself with minor damage on the premise that one the next decade it will be replaced and would have been discarded any how.
On a show tree I use very small gauge copper wire to secure flaky bark in place. If you look closely at this tree you can see the thin wire in place securing the flaky bark. It is accepted for show purposes and causes no damage. However it cannot be used for modifying angle, direction or movement. Simply preserving the exterior flakey bark for a longer period of time. Glueing pieces carefully back in place is effective short term.
Should note that increasing the health of collected trees often resulted in growth spurts and speeds up the discarding of flaky bark.

 

[ShadyStump]

I don't like wiring much to begin with, so I'm not great at it.

I generally prefer weights and guy wires wherever they work, partly because they don't damage bark as much, and there's less risk of the wires biting in too hard.

That said, I do need to get better at wiring. There are some things you just can't do without it.

 

[Shibui]

Flaky bark will grow back. Just takes a few years. See above from @River's Edge
Any wrap you put on will also damage the bark almost as much as the wire so no advantage there.
Flaky/corky bark is just a factor of the old bark not falling away so gluing it back won't hurt. No glue will affect the tree through the bark as far as I know.

 

[cishepard]

Thank you all for your input. Frank, @River's Edge here is the tree in question and close ups of some of the branches with patches of missing bark. It is a yamadori Shore Pine that was given to me by an acquaintance who is downsizing his collection. He’s had the tree so long that he doesn’t remember where it came from. He had a bunch of wire and zip ties on the tree that I have taken off, that’s when I noticed the bark falling off (not to mention wire scars). I do feel that the bark on the skinny branches give the tree a lot of character and I don’t know if it will grow back on branches this old (where it’s fallen off looks like bare wood underneath).
My vision for the tree includes completely different positions for every branch.

 

[Matte91]

I also glued flakey bark back on many times. I seen Bjorn doing it too.

 

[River's Edge]

Thank you all for your input. Frank, @River's Edge here is the tree in question and close ups of some of the branches with patches of missing bark. It is a yamadori Shore Pine that was given to me by an acquaintance who is downsizing his collection. He’s had the tree so long that he doesn’t remember where it came from. He had a bunch of wire and zip ties on the tree that I have taken off, that’s when I noticed the bark falling off (not to mention wire scars). I do feel that the bark on the skinny branches give the tree a lot of character and I don’t know if it will grow back on branches this old (where it’s fallen off looks like bare wood underneath).
My vision for the tree includes completely different positions for every branch.

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That is not the normal situation in my experience. Typically the outer bark flakes, not exposing such a bare patch. I would tend to consider that wire damage from improper application and removal of wire. You could glue the bark back on if you had the piece that came off that site! zIf possible I would consider removal of that section and redesign if possible. At times, when I encounter this type of bark on smaller branches and trunks I prefer to use thicker wire with looser wraps to guide direction and placement. The spindly growth of shore pine is difficult to manage with just guy wires. Too contorted. Hope the ramblings make sense.

 

[namnhi]

We do want to be as careful as can be when working with pine that has nice bark... but from my observation, once the bark started to look nice and thick... the time to replace the ones that peeled is not as slow as the time to get them bark up. That is what I have seen with my pines. Hard to not peel off a little here and there when you have to wire them.