Privet Yardadori Loads of Deadwood, What to do? (ligustrum ovalifolium)

[Sticks 'n' Triangles]

My first time collecting somewhat of an actual tree, rather than a tiny sapling. Lots of carving to do in the future, I'm sure!

This lovely lady let me dig up her privets that were clinging on to the bank, for free!
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I stuck one in a box and the other two were joined so put into a crate, as I didn't want to disturb the roots too much.


What should I do with all the deadwood and rotting wood. I take it the softer rotting wood should be carved rather than tried to be preserved? If so, can this be done soon after collection?

And for the hard deadwood, can this be treated with lime sulphur and/or wood hardener now?

Many thanks in advance.

 

[Sticks 'n' Triangles]

Original first pic before

 

[BrianBay9]

First, let them recover from collection. Privet are tough so you shouldn't have any problem with survival, but they still need to re-establish a root system. Then I think your first priority should be establishing a base that doesn't highlight significant reverse taper. Next year perhaps you might ground layer these to get roots growing at the bottoms of each of the bulges. After that you have lots of design options to consider. Nice start. Have fun!

 

[PonderingSage:]

I’d look at harry harrington’s work on bonsai4me. He has a couple of cool tree progressions with privet.

 

[Sticks 'n' Triangles]

I was blessed to be able to work with Harry and the B4me crew a couple weeks ago. This is what we did to the pair in the big crate.

I have since reduced the foliage on the left one to build some structure, no pics yet.

The right will hopefully be a nice kinda raft style once developed.