How to develop/grow a baby sapling JBP into Niwaki? What are the correct Steps?

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Shohin
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Super nice pics and trees! Thanks for sharing,

Niwaki literally translates to “garden tree” ...and can be any tree in the garden, both free-growing or trained similar to bonsai. I’ve seen JBPs in gardens in Japan that range from 4’ tall to 50’ tall. But, many are trained to be smaller in scale than the huge free-growing ones, because it’s easier to enjoy/appreciate when it’s in human scale and viewed closer (kinda like how small bonsai is appreciated/enjoyed)
 

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This thread needs more pictures!

Ok!!! :)

I guess I’ll post some pics from my last Japan trip…

I still haven’t finished editing all of my pics yet.. but I’ll try to post whenever I finish any new pics with cool trees in them.
Next pics will be from Yokohama and Sapporo gardens.

Not all JBPs… some different Niwaki/garden-trees too...

https://flic.kr/p/2eEuqP1
https://flic.kr/p/2fUyfcs
https://flic.kr/p/2fZajKF
https://flic.kr/p/2g2cFrr
https://flic.kr/p/2g2cFjg
https://flic.kr/p/2g2cJn5

https://flic.kr/p/2g43a6H

https://flic.kr/p/2g43gE4

https://flic.kr/p/2g5mYAu

https://flic.kr/p/2g6xBVi

https://flic.kr/p/2g794DK

https://flic.kr/p/2geSWsH

https://flic.kr/p/2gh6HBq

https://flic.kr/p/2gi2fPj

https://flic.kr/p/2gi3kvF

https://flic.kr/p/2giuejb

https://flic.kr/p/2gnvQCF





And, a few from an older trip…

https://flic.kr/p/Ydw1Fo

https://flic.kr/p/Yh1UW1

https://flic.kr/p/ZpyHfy

https://flic.kr/p/ZcWVPJ
 

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Not a JBP..but 1 of my 4 garden/niwaki Eugenias...

Gave this guy (Eugenia) a haircut today. (in its’ past life, it used to be a large ball, about 7’x7’ tall and wide).

I have 3 more Eugenias in the front yard. 2 are Twins about 10-11’ tall right next to each other, I styled in a weird giant literati-ish style (since all the growth/branches T-off and split-up above 7’ and no main/big branches below that, I think because it’s shaded by a brick-wall closeby)... used to be just a large round-canopy bush-tree.

...and my other 1 is just a big 12’ upright with a single trunk, more boring... originally, it was one of those typical garden-center Eugenias with 3 rings/levels of foliage, but I pruned a lot of its’ inner crotch growths of the original 3 rings for separation into individual branches and pads.
 

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Here are my front-yard Eugenia “Twins” that I mentioned earlier.

First 2 pics are far, from the street/sidewalk.

Pics 3 4 5 are about 10-15’ away.

Last pic is from the backyard, about 20-30’ away, poking above and behind the brickwall and guava tree (I also styled the guava tree... it too was just a huge shrub/ball before)
 

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And here is the last Eugenia of mine, the upright one that I mentioned earlier.

It used to be one of those Eugenias that everybody has, with 3 “rings” or balls of foliage. I pruned the insides heavily to separate individual branches last year. Actually gave this one a quick haircut today as well. Also, as you can see, I am trying to grow more branches to fill in early spaces and to stray away from the generic “3 ring” look from brick-n-mortar garden center Eugenias.
 

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Here are my 2 niwaki JBPs (they are my only mature/old JBPs... my other 4 JBPs are in the first OPs, the small pencil-thick ones).
 

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And here is a Star Lavendar ...it too was just a large hedge, a big 4’x4’ square. This is the best I could do. I know I know...it’s ugly, lol.

Styled it last year. Gave it a haircut a few weeks ago as it was getting very bushy again. Also growing 2 new branches on the left side.
 

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Here is more of my garden and garden-trees.

1st pic is an Imoto Fuyu Persimmon (across the grape-vine) I just planted a couple months ago in spring. It was a bare-root grafted whip with no branches. It leafed out nicely.

2nd and 3rd pics are Ume (one is white Ume and one is pink Ume). They were also both planted this spring and were also bare-root grafted whips with no branches. They both leafed and branched out. As you can see, one of them is super vigorous. All that growth is just from this year.

Last 3 pics is a bush I restyled about 1-2 years ago. Unknown plant (anyone know??). It was a huge 5’x5’ square or circle with hundreds/thousands of twigs inside, like all the others I restyled. Lots of branch selection pruning on this one, like the rest. It has an interesting, crazy, zig-zaggy trunk line.
 

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Here’s a video of their (the 4 baby saplings) current state:

Re-cap, my ideal goal and visualization - small Niwaki garden tree about 6’ tall (not a small bonsai, but also not a huge 15-25’+ Niwaki garden tree). Anywhere from 5-7’ would be ideal.

They seem healthy and vigorous (this year especially), and now about 1.25” thick at base.

I reduced spring whorl candles into 2/bifurcation in May for the secondary branches and wired them horizontally (whorls had 6-12 candles each). The candles were already +6" long in May.

I also left a backup/insurance leader for all 4 of them (and also a few backup/insurance side-branches higher up), because the current long leader’s internode is super long, leaving a large gap/space between its’ new upcoming whorl and the lower existing branches.

So, my current concern is the very large gap/space between the long leader’s new whorl and the existing lower branches.
Should I keep it, or chop it off and replace it with my backup/insurance leaders?
Will that long leader produce lower side branches to fill in that very large space/gap?

Another concern is that my overall trunk curves, curve size, movement are maybe too small, unnoticeable and less-pronounced for a larger 6’ garden tree (say, viewed from a distance). Perhaps I should make the movement and curves with much bigger radius and slants? Maybe even just clip&grow the leaders over time to create larger radius curves and slants built with long, straight-sections of the trunk/leaders/internodes? (dunno if that made sense... maybe, visualize building/making a very large curve with a rigid, straight 12" ruler)
 

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If you're concerned about the new leader being a bit too long and leggy there's not much harm in cutting back into it a little lower down to force a new flush of growth there and probably more back budding further down at the same time?
I've got quite a few 7 or 8 year old pines destined to be much larger niwaki in varying but mostly early stages of development at the moment that i've been cutting back into with good results thus far.

I'd definitely say you'll probably want to create some more aggressive shaping in your trunks while you still can though....when you're growing them really strongly even a couple of years is all it takes to make it a real pain to introduce more curves down the line.
I started working on my first niwaki black pine about 7 or 8 years ago and what appeared to be good movement at the time in a thin trunk (quite similar to the leaders in yours at the moment) has slowly become less and less noticeable as the trunk and branches have become bigger and bigger.
 

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If you're concerned about the new leader being a bit too long and leggy there's not much harm in cutting back into it a little lower down to force a new flush of growth there and probably more back budding further down at the same time?
I've got quite a few 7 or 8 year old pines destined to be much larger niwaki in varying but mostly early stages of development at the moment that i've been cutting back into with good results thus far.

I'd definitely say you'll probably want to create some more aggressive shaping in your trunks while you still can though....when you're growing them really strongly even a couple of years is all it takes to make it a real pain to introduce more curves down the line.
I started working on my first niwaki black pine about 7 or 8 years ago and what appeared to be good movement at the time in a thin trunk (quite similar to the leaders in yours at the moment) has slowly become less and less noticeable as the trunk and branches have become bigger and bigger.

How much lower down should I cut it? Around where I made those bends/elbows on the leggy leaders, or a little higher up?

My concern with cutting them a little lower, down to no other existing side-shoots (ie: only cutting down to needles), is that those long leaders are already browning/hardening-off and not green anymore. From my research (which could be wrong), I've read browned/hardened-off shoots might only produce 1 new candle when cut down to where only needles exist vs. cutting down to side-shoots/whorls/nodes. (ending up with the same leggy situation)

Cool! Please share pics/info of your Niwaki progress and development! I'd love to follow their progress. (esp since there's not much info/discussion out there for Niwaki specifically)

Makes perfect sense about my small curves! ...I guess I will try to re-shape the trunks into much bigger/taller radius curves, maybe a 2-3' tall "C" shape for the first curve. They are already super stiff atm, esp lower down the trunk.... so idk if it's possible.
And, perhaps, clip&grow and directional-pruning will suffice for shaping the trunk into much bigger radius curves.
 
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