Not bad!! Definitely want to see the old pics, always exciting!!!
I was gonna ask when you pruned it last, then you posted up the 2nd set of pics
The movement is nice and smooth. No idea on the best top here.
Thanks, I generally prune it only once or twice a year... they grow slow in a Bonsai pots and constantly removing new growth really weakens Juniper- despite what some training techniques may tell people to do... I prefer happy, healthy trees, not trees stunted because they are barely clinging to life.
I feel like many people wind up picking at their Junipers until they get weak, then they get a bug or fungus that they cannot recover from because they were weak and eventually the tree dies... then we get the "why did my Juniper turn brown" threads. If you allow them to recover between pruning and send long runners out, you know the tree is healthy an d ready for work.
This isn't a Shimpaku obviously, which is what most people are working on. I have plenty of those too, but it is fun to work with something different every now and then. I have taken a bunch of cuttings from this guy and, because they grow so much faster than a Shimpaku when you let them go, I am doing some experiments with fusing trunks of the Sargent with Shimpaku, grafting... to make larger, twisted trees from smaller cuttings... seems to be going well so far. I have 2-3 where both the Shimpakua be Sargent are living and growing rapidly, takes a few years for them to meld together though...