New to pines. Pine comparison?

[bonsairxmd]

I'm new to pines and just received a SW white pine from Brent. Deciduous tree growth and pruning just always seemed more intuitive to me but I'm wanting to learn more and to try pines

Can forum members chime in for a comparison with advantages and disadvantages of various pines used for bonsai such as Japanese Black, White, Mugo, Pondorosa, Pitch and Scot's? Characteristics such as achievable needle length reduction, speed of growth/development into nice bonsai, 'beginner' or experienced pine, back budding on old wood, and general hardiness would be helpful

Thanks......

 

[Adair M]

Japanese Black Pine is "The King of Bonsai".

. It is very responsive to bonsai techniques. Very vigorous, fast growing, builds trunk girth quickly, creates rough (old looking) bark quickly, tolerates root work well, will produce two flushes of growth a season, the branches are flexible enough to bend with wire, yet the branches will "set" in a season or two, needle length is easily managed with the proper techniques, back buds well, easy to graft, cab be started as bonsai from seed, or from nursery stock, and lastly, there is a vast amount of information available about JBP.

The other pines may have some of the attributes I listed above, but not all of them.

Most particularly, they are slower growing. With only one flush of growth per year. This makes development very slow. And it makes mistakes hard to correct.

They usually have shorter needles. Which attracts beginners because beginners don't know how to induce short needles. JBP left on its own will have needles of 4 inches or more. And when a beginner sees that, it scares them off. My JBP I've been training for a couple years will have needles under an inch. In fact, once you know what you're doing, you can determine how long of a needle you want. Big trees should have longer needles than small trees. And it's possible for you to control that.

The other pines, you cannot. (Maybe a little, but not to the degree that's possible with JBP).

My advice is to learn "pines" with a JBP. Then, you can learn the other varieties.

 

[fourteener]

The question is really too big to answer very well. The great thing about pines is also the problem. The great thing is that after you get them into a style you want, they won't grow out of it very fast. The downside is they won't grow into a design very fast.

Being in OKlahoma you might as well master Black pine. Ryan Neil has a couple of good videos that express a timeline of events in a year of growth. I could tell you a lot of differences, but it would be a lot of info that wouldn't be helpful.

Some people are intimidated by pines. It's too bad, after you witness a few growth cycles you figure out what you can/can't do.

Being up north, I do more cold-hardy pines...ponderosa, scots, eastern white, black are the pines I work with, along with a couple JBP and JWP. The Japanese pines need winter protection in my neck of the woods.

 

[bonsairxmd]

Thanks for your response. Very informative. Any suggestions on where to find JBP nursery stock to work with that has some decent trunk size as Brent does not currently have any gallon size JBP right now

I would be interested in hearing from others as well about the advantages and disadvantages of the other pines for educational purposes. I've found and read lots of information on each one but no great comparisons or pros and cons.

 

[bonsairxmd]

Ok. Thanks. Are those videos on YouTube?

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

Adair and Terry are right on. JBP is a good move where you are. White pine may not thrive in your climate; they are high-altitude, dry soil trees. A good Ryan Neil video is here. I'm biased, but I also recommend this fantastic ebook on JBP. Welcome to the works of pines. It will take 2 years, but when it "clicks", you'll have it down forever.

 

[fourteener]

Adair and Terry are right on. JBP is a good move where you are. White pine may not thrive in your climate; they are high-altitude, dry soil trees. A good Ryan Neil video is here. I'm biased, but I also recommend this fantastic ebook on JBP. Welcome to the works of pines. It will take 2 years, but when it "clicks", you'll have it down forever.

Nice ebook, by the way. Very helpful.

 

[iant]

I have a SW white pine from Brent for the last 3 yrs. It's very hardy, grows fairly vigorously. I have it in full sun on the warm side of the patio. The trunk is still fairly barkless. They're very easy to bend. Mine is 3/4 inch now and I could still really bend it. You might as well do that now if you want to give it some curve. The wire cuts in pretty easily as the bark is thin and it's a vigorous grower so you have to watch it. In one season if it's growing well wire can really cut in. One more thing watch out for inverse taper at whorls. All pines have this issue but I have to say the SW WP seems to do it faster than my JBP. They grow quickly and if you leave a bunch of branches at the same level you'll get a bulge there. I like my SW WP and would recommend them.
Ian

 

[bonsairxmd]

Great advice on SW white pine. Thanks iant!

Any particular cultivar of JBP that is recommended to start with?

 

[Jason_mazzy]

Stay away from the cork barks for now. Standard mikawa are great. You can do JRP also (red pine). Beautiful pines not as vigorous as the JBP but same techniques.

 

[bonsairxmd]

What is it about the cork barks that are not the best choice for a beginner?

 

[jaholmes]

Where would be a good place to find JBP seedlings and/or suitable prebonsai?

 

[Adair M]

On eBay, George Murkana sells JBP he has grown in the ground for several years, then chopped, then grown a couple more. He keeps low branches, and they've begun ramification. They start at about $100, and have trunks of an inch to an inch and a half.

You can't go wrong working with one of them. It won't make a "Great" bonsai, but it will make a pleasing one, you'll learn a lot from it. He uses mikawa seed.

Why avoid cork barks?

First off, they're almost always grafted onto regular JBP stock, and you get an obvious reverse taper union. They don't grow well: they spend their energy growing bark, not in growth. Hard to wire because you'll damage the bark. Same with bending, bend the branch, the bark breaks off. Since they're less vigorous, you can't decandle them as often as regular JBP, so they'll have longer needles. It's just difficult material. They're grown just to appreciate the bark. If it has "style", that's a bonus.

Mind you, there are some spectacular corkers. It's just they're not beginner friendly.

I don't have any statistics to back up this statement, but my friends who have been to Japan and visited the gardens and nurseries there tell me that about half of all bonsai in Japan appear to be JBP. All the other varieties combined make up the other half.

 

[Lazylightningny]

If money is an issue, as it is for me, the only pines suitable for bonsai available at big box stores are Mugos. Others available at specialty nurseries are quite expensive. This is also an issue when you are a beginner and you kill a lot of trees.

 

[Adair M]

Lazy,

That might be true where you live. Mugos do well in colder climates.

In really cold climates, JBP do need some winter protection.

It's always easier to grow trees that like your local climate.

 

[bonsairxmd]

Adair M - PM sent

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

I'm a little late to this dance, been in the mountains of NC without much (if any) internet connection for the weekend.

As usual, Adair is right, Muranaka pines are a good place to start because they are in the later stages of growing out, so you can wire branches quickly, begin to understand how they grow and respond to our techniques, and have something pretty rewarding pretty quickly.

On corkers, they are slower, don't respond well to candle pruning, and are really a novelty. Later if you want one, get one you really like, and just enjoy it. Here is a comparison of a tall corker and a standard JBP over 5.5 years, first photo of each is from fall '08, second photo of each is from tonight. The 5th photo compares their needle length. They're both doing well, but clearly you can advance standard jbp much faster.

 

[bonsairxmd]

Great visual demonstration. Thanks. Your e book is informative also. Can you list all the non cork bark varieties that would work to start with so I have options as I'm having a hard time finding any JBP stock right now to work with.

 

[dick benbow]

So tell me what local pines grow in "your neck of the woods" and why wouldn't you start with them as they're already acclimated to your region.
About half my collection is pines. I have about half a dozen japanese varieties. 3 european and the rest pines here from the Northwest. A few shore pines that are a sub species of lodgepole ( so named because they were used as such by the indians). My favorites are local white pines, Limber and whitebark.
What got me started on local pines, was a japanese instructor who confided one day to me that he couldn't understand why we used so many japanese varieties and little of our own.
So the first thing I did was to go out and acquire a ponderosa which I still have today. In fact I just today removed all the developing pollen buds.
Pines because their evergreen cover up a lot of ongoing carnage, unlike the winter look of deciduous. Pines should be a piece of cake if you have deciduous down....best treatment of pines comes from the knowledge of Ryan Neil.

 

[Adair M]

Mikawa is a good JBP variety. It's not really a cultivated strain, it's the name of an island which has JBP growing there. Seeds grown from trees there are called Mikawa.

But, really, it doesn't matter. The Japanese don't pay much attention to the variety. Unless it's a cork bark. Since they are grafted, you can get particular traits that define the strain. Trees grow from seed will vary a lot.

The tree that is my avatar is not a Mikawa. But it's a nice tree!