Refining/Maintaining Shimpaku Foliage

mrcasey said:

As I understand it, the most accepted method for refined shimpaku foliage pruning, to do the following.

1. Clean out dead foliage.
2. Remove downward growing stems and foliage.
3. On each foliage clump, cut the strong extended runners back to a vigorous fork in the foliage clump.
4. Remove the weak foliage that typically grows closer to the base or behind each branch's foliage clump.

The idea is that the very strongest and very weakest growth is removed, thereby balancing vigor on all areas of the
tree.

The work is typically done in very early summer and then again in mid/late summer.

Do I have it right?

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bwaynef said:

I've posted this to several similar threads, but it was very informative to me. It shows how to clean juniper/shimpaku foliage & how to arrange it. As far as cutback, I haven't found a great illustration. You want to always be refining, while also leaving options for the next refinement that's necessary. Remove crotch growth unless that's what you're going to cut back to.

Also, I differ with the advice given above. I'd prefer to remove the weak foliage and grow a backbud into place. Removing weak foliage seems to really promote vigor at the tips, which (vigor) is what drives backbudding, either along the branch or from a preceding crotch.

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bwaynef said:

The graphic above gets the gist of it correct but encourages pinching which has been established as poor technique, particularly during development. At no point should you remove all the growing tips from juniper growth (as is illustrated in the 3rd row of the 2nd phase in the graphic above). At some point, in refinement, runners/whips will develop that clearly have more energy than the surrounding foliage. Those need to be removed, and its ok to use your fingers.

Also, in developing the foliage, you need to add more downward movement, generally right below a branch. This is part of what Boon calls that "more elbow". (There's a little more to it, but that comes with ultra-refinement.) This enhances the apparent age, but also serves to narrow the silhouette. (See "pad-development1.jpg)

When arranging branches, arrange the foliage in a way that has them organized, uniform in density, and radiating outward in a consistent manner. The graphic (pad-formation.jpg) uses pine foliage, but juniper branches are built the same way.

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Dav4 said:

I believe I've seen that image in the Stone Lantern book, 'Junipers', which is essentially a compilation of Japanese bonsai magazine articles from the 80's and early 90's. They are great articles with wonderful pictures, but finger pinching growing tips (which I did for almost a decade... with a strong tree, you could get away with it until you couldn't) is definitely an outdated technique. Other than pulling/cleaning out weak growth, I haven't used my fingers to prune a juniper in close to 2 decades .

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