Hoping for advice/critiques on my "branch-structure building" approach :)

[SU2]

I just pulled yet another tree (bougie) that'd grown to a bush the past quarter-year and I hard-pruned its canopy however I look at the 'nekkid bones' of this guy and am worrying I've got something wrong, have posted elsewhere about it and someone mentioned something I'd pondered which is simply too many branches IE while ramification is good, it's for the outer-edges of the canopy, and that the problem with my approach so far has been that I'm allowing *too many* branches to run (meaning that when I hard-prune I'm shortening everything, but removing almost no branches, I maybe removed 10 or 15 from this guy while working him over the past week and am suspecting I should've removed double, even triple that)

Here's a photo close-up of a 'pad' (am I using that right?) from the specimen I'm talking about:


(will post more pics of this tree at end-of-post)

Aaaand here's a photo/screenshot from a video I was just watching where I saw some branch-pads that were, essentially, what I'm aiming for (although to be fair I'm actually aiming for a tighter canopy than shown but not by that much)


So if I'm going for something like ^that, and my growing-approach is just "let them bush-out, then cut-back hard, rinse&repeat til you hit the In-Refinement stage", what about my results so far should I be trying to change? Am guessing branch-density but then when I look at this I don't see that it's got any fewer branches-per-inch in the canopy so I dunno, maybe I am on-point? (oh and on that note, while I welcome & actually love critiques, I'd appreciate context/quantification if at all possible, like instead of "too many branches" it'd be far more helpful to hear "just a bit, 1/5tth maybe, too-many branches" or "too many branches, at least by double", *anything* that lets me contextualize your reply for its severity/quantity

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Some more photos of the tree I'm finishing-up now, this guy's had a few summers' growth and has filled in nicely (IMO) and I kinda thought summer 2020 would be 'its year' IE swap-over from Development to Refinement but if I've gotten something majorly wrong in buildling my branch-structure then I'll need another year to correct it
These photos were taken in an order & at angles that I thought would be most-illustrative of the tree/its pads, thing doesn't lend itself to photography well
in-bed still:

whole tree in its summer grow-out bed:

birdseye view of branch-pads with black backdrop:

A handful more of the individual pads' close-ups:

The tree is meant to have 1 large top canopy spanning the entire container, though it'll be made of 30/70% left-side-canopy // right-side-canopy, just due to how much trunk-mass is on either side. At least one of the upper pinnacles of the trunk (and its corresponding branch/primary) will be removed as a couple clash with each other, just haven't decided which to ditch yet...Then there's those two lower, side-of-trunk pads, they kinda reach-towards the camera in "front shots", at any rate those will each be their own 'pad', distinct from the upper canopy & from each other. All of this is being done with a focus on having as-much-as-possible of the trunk's body showing, love this trunk & don't want to hide any of it!!

~~~~~~~~~~

Again thanks a ton for any&all thoughts on this, I'm genuinely happy to get anything from "looks weird" to "I like it" to, obviously, thought-out answers on styling, but yeah any&all criticism, positive or negative, would be greatly appreciated (and obviously will answer Q's, am sure the zip-ties pop-out at people lol, they work for me [I wire as well they're just 1 tool in the kit!] so I make-use of them whenever I can!)

 

[sorce]

This is the best resource for structural pruning I've found.

Sorce

 

[defra]

My guess is As long as each branch extend into two you are building the branch that will form the pad the right way so if you have a primary or secondary branch that splits into more then two a decision have to be made which one has to go structural pruning trough the wole tree will result in only usable and correct build branches
1-2-4-8-16-32 etc eventualy the branch has enough twigs so that the pad forms

 

[Adair M]

Yes, you should decide on a primary branch line. Think of it as a secondary “trunk”. From it, you want secondary branches, alternating left and right.

Here are some diagrams of examples. (They’re pines, but convey the idea)



This diagram above shows branches going every which way.



Now that it’s wired, there’s a central main leader, and secondaries alternating off it.






This shows another example. The top drawing shows an unorganized branch, the bottom shows an organized branch structure.

 

[SU2]

My guess is As long as each branch extend into two you are building the branch that will form the pad the right way so if you have a primary or secondary branch that splits into more then two a decision have to be made which one has to go structural pruning trough the wole tree will result in only usable and correct build branches
1-2-4-8-16-32 etc eventualy the branch has enough twigs so that the pad forms

Thanks!!!

To be sure I'm understanding though, isn't 'Pad' just 'bundle of branches that are located together inside-of the canopy'? The way you phrase it makes it sound like they're not pads til you're building the outer edges ('in-refinement'), however I've always thought of pads as "the building-blocks of the canopy", in fact in my sketches I draw individual abstract pads when trying to form a canopy(on-paper) because a bunch of clumps equaling a whole is how a tree looks great, but I'd been using 'pad' to describe stuff like the example shown in the 1st pic on this page (well, that could end-up being 2 separate pads, in that there's 2 primaries feeding that area and I'm uncertain if they'll be separated, almost-certainly not though so that's 2 primaries feeding 1 'pad'), a quick glance looks like that pad is around the 32-tip phase of 'refinement' (am I correct in thinking that this tree is basically out-of-development and firmly "middle-ground" to 'in-refinement'? I've got a good feeling that, come this time next year, I'll already be doing only silhouette prunes & will be going with smaller containers to start reducing leaf-size, am planning to have it "finished" in 2021 although of course it's never finished it'll always improve til it dies I just mean 'final form achieved', it's pretty nice being in such a fast-growing zone it may limit me from a lot of great coniferous species but damn do a lot of these species here grow like weeds!!)

 

[sorce]

I should've removed double, even triple that)

I'd say like this. Keeping the green ones.

At some point.

Sorce

 

[defra]

Thanks!!!

To be sure I'm understanding though, isn't 'Pad' just 'bundle of branches that are located together inside-of the canopy'? The way you phrase it makes it sound like they're not pads til you're building the outer edges ('in-refinement'), however I've always thought of pads as "the building-blocks of the canopy", in fact in my sketches I draw individual abstract pads when trying to form a canopy(on-paper) because a bunch of clumps equaling a whole is how a tree looks great, but I'd been using 'pad' to describe stuff like the example shown in the 1st pic on this page (well, that could end-up being 2 separate pads, in that there's 2 primaries feeding that area and I'm uncertain if they'll be separated, almost-certainly not though so that's 2 primaries feeding 1 'pad'), a quick glance looks like that pad is around the 32-tip phase of 'refinement' (am I correct in thinking that this tree is basically out-of-development and firmly "middle-ground" to 'in-refinement'? I've got a good feeling that, come this time next year, I'll already be doing only silhouette prunes & will be going with smaller containers to start reducing leaf-size, am planning to have it "finished" in 2021 although of course it's never finished it'll always improve til it dies I just mean 'final form achieved', it's pretty nice being in such a fast-growing zone it may limit me from a lot of great coniferous species but damn do a lot of these species here grow like weeds!!)

I think you understand yes, the apex exists out of multiple branches pruned and shaped the same way as any other branch on the tree the apex is another word for crown and simply means the top part of the tree.

in the second drawing in adair's post you can see how the branches with foliage form the pad (layer) of green exactly how I ment it.

 

[Shibui]

I'd been using 'pad' to describe stuff like the example shown in the 1st pic on this page (well, that could end-up being 2 separate pads, in that there's 2 primaries feeding that area and I'm uncertain if they'll be separated, almost-certainly not though so that's 2 primaries feeding 1 'pad'),

I would say that you have 2 secondary branches forming that pad. They both appear to come from a primary branch that comes off the main trunk.
I think the problem us that you have a disorganised mass of twigs. While they may form a foliage pad, bonsai is also about aesthetics. It also needs to look good and currently the eye does not know which way to follow. Defra talked about pruning so there are only 2 at any point. Others use the term 'wyes' =Y shaped forks. I know this as 2x2 pruning. Anywhere the tree divides there should only be 2 parts. The trunk divides into a branch and the rest of the trunk. A branch divides into a side branch and the continuation of the main branch. Adair's diagrams show this clearly. The oft quoted 'bar branch' is an example of not 2x2 or Y pruning and you have plenty of spots where the branch divides into 3 or 4 at a single fork.
Thin those out and shorten each section so they divide again and you will have a good pad with both density and flow.

 

[SU2]

Yes, you should decide on a primary branch line. Think of it as a secondary “trunk”. From it, you want secondary branches, alternating left and right.

Here are some diagrams of examples. (They’re pines, but convey the idea)

View attachment 264637

This diagram above shows branches going every which way.

View attachment 264638

Now that it’s wired, there’s a central main leader, and secondaries alternating off it.




View attachment 264636

This shows another example. The top drawing shows an unorganized branch, the bottom shows an organized branch structure.

Thanks! I do, however, think a slightly different approach needs to be taken to such highly-ramifying vines as bougainvilleas though, insofar as going less for total# of branch-splits in-favor-of going for more branch-tips closer to the trunking (ie super tight/dense canopies)

When multiple branches, such as the one in picture 2 of your post, are organized together - do you "stack them on-top-of" each other? I find that I've got a tendency towards that and am unsure if it's proper, for instance if a branch splits to two, and one is going a bit upwards and the other a bit downwards, I'll always correct them to be on the same horizontal plane ...hope that's correct!

~~~~~~~~~`
Neat drawings BTW, where are they from? FWIW I guess I should've posted this earlier, am embarrassed as my drawings aren't for others so they probably look ridiculous but they make sense to me LOL, at any rate I altered this one a lil to make it better-understandable to others, this is the final-goal for the tree, it'll have a "flat-tipped triangle" top of the canopy (that'll be like 80% of the canopy and encompass the entire top), then there'll be the left-lower-front pad, the one from the 1st picture on this page, that'll be a separate, lower pad. There's a heavy focus on keeping the center clear/open to showcase the trunking:


lol yeah I know it's a silly sketch but hopefully conveys what I'm trying to do here, if anything I'm aiming for a bit tighter of a canopy than that I really want it to 'hug' the trunk, while keeping a substantial-enough area of the trunk visible! Container will be a 'stoneware-style' pot, though it'll be hand-made from concrete (I stopped doing this a while ago because I was making show-containers for trees-in-development, in ~1yr I should be able to start making appropriate 'final/show' containers for a lot of my bougies, crazy that just a few years is enough for this much growth, gotta love tropicals growing in a 10b enviro )

 

[SU2]

I'd say like this. Keeping the green ones.View attachment 264659

At some point.

Sorce

This confuses me (not what you're saying/showing, I fully get the idea!), it seems you'd suggest removing a lot of what I'd thought was OK - can I ask for your thoughts on why you chose your lines like that? TBH I was thinking that 'proper' (which is what I want!!) would be something like that, don't think I wanted to admit it to myself because of how much I'd have to remove (ie wasted growth/time) but want to do it right not quick (though quick is a nice 2nd-place goal ;D )

Oh and another thing I failed to mention: I've begun thinking that, while I was worrying about "too many branches-per-inch" that low/deep in the canopy, maybe it's not that bad considering that my goal is to have a very tight, trunk-hugging canopy, not a big one...am going to need to dwell in my folder of bougie-pics (others' pics/show-bougies) for some inspiration!!

 

[SU2]

I think you understand yes, the apex exists out of multiple branches pruned and shaped the same way as any other branch on the tree the apex is another word for crown and simply means the top part of the tree.

in the second drawing in adair's post you can see how the branches with foliage form the pad (layer) of green exactly how I ment it.

Heh, I think I way over-stated my degree of confusion with the nomenclature if you're telling me what a canopy/crown/apex is ;P I was simply digging-in to the specific definition of 'pad', it seems sometimes it's used to refer to 1 primary's final 'puff' of foliage at its outer-tips, while other times it's used to describe a distinct area of a canopy (regardless of whether there's multiple primaries feeding it)

 

[SU2]

I would say that you have 2 secondary branches forming that pad. They both appear to come from a primary branch that comes off the main trunk.
I think the problem us that you have a disorganised mass of twigs. While they may form a foliage pad, bonsai is also about aesthetics. It also needs to look good and currently the eye does not know which way to follow. Defra talked about pruning so there are only 2 at any point. Others use the term 'wyes' =Y shaped forks. I know this as 2x2 pruning. Anywhere the tree divides there should only be 2 parts. The trunk divides into a branch and the rest of the trunk. A branch divides into a side branch and the continuation of the main branch. Adair's diagrams show this clearly. The oft quoted 'bar branch' is an example of not 2x2 or Y pruning and you have plenty of spots where the branch divides into 3 or 4 at a single fork.
Thin those out and shorten each section so they divide again and you will have a good pad with both density and flow.

AWESOME!! So well-put, thanks a ton with this & @sorce 's drawing I'll be good-to-go I think!! Just opened-up the front/center of the trunk a bit more:

lol, not on-purpose, obviously, but really can't complain as it does open the center which is something I'd really wanted! Was just bending one of the outer branches but it was too thick so the pressure traveled all the way back to the collar and popped it, tbh I hadn't even glanced at the collar for structural-strength as it was far enough from the bend I didn't think it'd matter, then hear that *crack* noise we all dread lol

 

[sorce]

- can I ask for your thoughts on why you chose your lines like that?

It was Bjorn or Owen in a BAoJ video "cut back to finer branching".

It seems too crowded. Especially for a flowering tree.

I am having a hard time telling of that is top down or side view....cuz it kinda goes both ways.

With opposite leafed species, I try to keep an upward growing bud for fill further back, which begins it's own 24816, then cut back to 2 side nodes, so the branch fans out like Adair's diagram.

I believe this is in that Mirai video. Ryan explains it as he does......very well.

Sorce

 

[SU2]

I should mention that the substrate is high for a reason, this is the first potting where the 'real' bottom of the specimen will be exposed so, due to some fine surface roots in certain areas, I kinda had to 'clump' balls of soil (well, half soil half sphagnum to promote rooting!) around such spots, I do this often w/ great results the excess simply gets hosed-off the surface over-time while I'm watering, good way to expose roots w/o shocking the thing too much!

 

[SU2]

It was Bjorn or Owen in a BAoJ video "cut back to finer branching".

It seems too crowded. Especially for a flowering tree.

I am having a hard time telling of that is top down or side view....cuz it kinda goes both ways.

With opposite leafed species, I try to keep an upward growing bud for fill further back, which begins it's own 24816, then cut back to 2 side nodes, so the branch fans out like Adair's diagram.

I believe this is in that Mirai video. Ryan explains it as he does......very well.

Sorce

Thanks a lot man

(and yeah look up for a hand-drawn pic, that's what it'll look like eventually lol, I know pics of it now are very hard to process and almost look the same from all angles it's simply due to the final canopy shape being this all-encompassing mass!)

 

[sorce]

We do what we want right?
But.

Good branching is good branching is good branching.

It's sustainable. This is key.

For a new approach....

think a slightly different approach needs to be taken to such highly-ramifying vines as bougainvilleas though, i

I have been cutting everything back at times of less response.

You know how everyone asks "when should I cut for the most backbudding?" ?

I cut at the opposite time, for the worst backbudding.

Doing so should keep you from having too many branches to deal with.

Cut back to 2 buds/branches, watch so no others form, and only they will grow out, larger, more healthy, then at a period of little backbudding, cut back 2 2 again....etc etc

I Believe only trees that need backbudding should be cut at peak times.

I don't buy those kind of trees cuz they take too long, and you are at the mercy of those backuds/grafting. F that.

Lotta trees suck cuz we have backbudding on a pedestal, when it's not always necessary.

Sorce

 

[SU2]

How's this looking? Just did 1 'pad' this way & wanted confirmation I'm doing this right before proceeding through the rest of the canopy, I also stopped on a couple others I'd recently hard-pruned and brought tthem back further to see if I'm getting it now!

Here's the pad from this thread's tree that I just cut back again:


And here's a couple other pads from other trees I just cut-back with the same intent:




Hope I'm getting it, reallllly don't want to waste more time growing-out branches that I think are 'final' but really aren't LOL

 

[Adair M]

Thanks! I do, however, think a slightly different approach needs to be taken to such highly-ramifying vines as bougainvilleas though, insofar as going less for total# of branch-splits in-favor-of going for more branch-tips closer to the trunking (ie super tight/dense canopies)

When multiple branches, such as the one in picture 2 of your post, are organized together - do you "stack them on-top-of" each other? I find that I've got a tendency towards that and am unsure if it's proper, for instance if a branch splits to two, and one is going a bit upwards and the other a bit downwards, I'll always correct them to be on the same horizontal plane ...hope that's correct!

~~~~~~~~~`
Neat drawings BTW, where are they from? FWIW I guess I should've posted this earlier, am embarrassed as my drawings aren't for others so they probably look ridiculous but they make sense to me LOL, at any rate I altered this one a lil to make it better-understandable to others, this is the final-goal for the tree, it'll have a "flat-tipped triangle" top of the canopy (that'll be like 80% of the canopy and encompass the entire top), then there'll be the left-lower-front pad, the one from the 1st picture on this page, that'll be a separate, lower pad. There's a heavy focus on keeping the center clear/open to showcase the trunking:
View attachment 264817

lol yeah I know it's a silly sketch but hopefully conveys what I'm trying to do here, if anything I'm aiming for a bit tighter of a canopy than that I really want it to 'hug' the trunk, while keeping a substantial-enough area of the trunk visible! Container will be a 'stoneware-style' pot, though it'll be hand-made from concrete (I stopped doing this a while ago because I was making show-containers for trees-in-development, in ~1yr I should be able to start making appropriate 'final/show' containers for a lot of my bougies, crazy that just a few years is enough for this much growth, gotta love tropicals growing in a 10b enviro )

On my post, second picture, where it shows the organized branch with the tips pointing out, look at the drawing at the top of the page. The side view of the branch. If you notice, it shows how to layer the interior branches. The longest branches should have the tips at the perimeter of the pad, and should be the lowest. The shorter branches don’t reach out as far, and aren’t on the same lowest level, they’re positioned a little higher up, so that they create a bit of height to the pad. The interior branches are still higher, forming to top layer of the pad. It’s a layered effect, creating a pad that gets thinner as it goes out towards the end.

My example is of a pine, but pretty much all trees make pads, and the general concept is the same. (Some styles, like broom style, don’t make pads).

But if you want to make effective pads, the layering approach is the way to go.

One more thing...

When building pads, occasionally put in a “top branch”. That’s an interior branch that does not go left or right, but runs in the same direction as the underlying primary branch. This can be trained to lay directly above the primary branch. It will provide height to the pad, and when the time comes to cut back the primary branch when it grows too long (as they all will, eventually), you have a ready-made branch to take its place.

 

[SU2]

I like your free-form style of posting, just had to get that out there ;D (except signing the posts, always seems so egotistical to sign-off a forum post IMO, though I used to think ego was a great thing so I'll shut my yap before getting philosophical in a pruning thread )

We do what we want right?
But.

Good branching is good branching is good branching.

It's sustainable. This is key.

Unsure what you mean about 'sustainable' here, but the rest encapsulates my thinking precisely, I grow what I want & do so for myself not for some goal of selling trees or competing with them, I want them to be my babies that I get to enjoy the rest of my life, but.....Good branching is good branching!!! And it's *this* that I've made the thread for, I hope you caught the post above this one as I just went outside and did a pad in the manner I interpretted the suggestions here as implying I do, hoping it passes muster but will have to wait on replies (then I'll apply that approach to the rest of the canopy, and a bunch of other canopies that I hard-pruned these past weeks, I hate the energy-waste when you gotta go hard-prune a branch you hard-pruned 1-2wks ago and it's already backbudding crazy strong but guess I should be happy I can even do that w/o killing stuff (bougies...in FL....almost un-killable!)

For a new approach....


I have been cutting everything back at times of less response.

You know how everyone asks "when should I cut for the most backbudding?" ?

I cut at the opposite time, for the worst backbudding.

Doing so should keep you from having too many branches to deal with.

This....this is great!! I've actually been doing this a lil bit already, intuitively, my pruning schedule has fallen into 3 distinct, garden-wide annual prunes:
moderate prune in spring when things are getting-going,
1st hard-prune as we go into summer, then
2nd hard-prune right around now, *just in time* for things to grow & harden-off before winter but not long-enough for them to really grow/run-on (they do that slowly through fall/winter and pick-up in spring)

I like this idea, although your framing of the concept implies people have differences in a way that I don't think is accurate, IE I think that backbudding is sometimes good and sometimes bad and that it's species, situation etc dependent, I expect that varying desires from varying artists are based more on that and less on 'hard-rules' of "a prune should always get backbudding optimized" (although I do see a knee-jerk reaction to wanting back-budding, but that's with good reason I mean if you weren't in-the-know about a piece of stock and you know it was to be pruned, you'd hope for backbudding- you can always rub-off buds, I do this as part of my normal maintenance actually, but you can't place buds where they aren't!


But yeah the fall hard-prune is great because it doesn't give the ridiculous backbudding that bougies are prone to, really think I'll be sticking with this schedule from now on (did it 'formally' like that last year, after finding I had to do garden-wide work and couldn't do individual trees much anymore, and the staggering worked so I copied it this year w/ great success )

Cut back to 2 buds/branches, watch so no others form, and only they will grow out, larger, more healthy, then at a period of little backbudding, cut back 2 2 again....etc etc

I Believe only trees that need backbudding should be cut at peak times.

I don't buy those kind of trees cuz they take too long, and you are at the mercy of those backuds/grafting. F that.

Lotta trees suck cuz we have backbudding on a pedestal, when it's not always necessary.

Sorce

I don't get what you mean about a lotta trees sucking because backbudding is esteemed, could you give an example? I think that, when dealing with the tiny canopy-space we're confined to, that backbudding - in a *general* sense - is an inherent good (again you can always just rub-off the buds, in fact sometimes I'll prune and leave 1, even 3-4 extra nodes on the branch and simply scratch-off the nodes so that I can retain the branch's cambium but don't have to worry about growing 4 nodes where I wanted 2, actually sometimes this is necessary as I can't see where the buds are so I have to prune further-out, wait a few days / a week, then I can go back to prune OR simply rub-off the furthest-out buds which again is my preferred method because it leaves inches of branch[w/o active buds] above the new branch/bud, it's *gotta* help the chosen ones burst stronger as opposed to cutting right-at-the-node!
Interested to hear your elaboration on backbudding in the terms you put it there, am wondering if you mean like conifers & how you don't need backbudding because you can just bend things into place?

 

[SU2]

On my post, second picture, where it shows the organized branch with the tips pointing out, look at the drawing at the top of the page. The side view of the branch. If you notice, it shows how to layer the interior branches. The longest branches should have the tips at the perimeter of the pad, and should be the lowest. The shorter branches don’t reach out as far, and aren’t on the same lowest level, they’re positioned a little higher up, so that they create a bit of height to the pad. The interior branches are still higher, forming to top layer of the pad. It’s a layered effect, creating a pad that gets thinner as it goes out towards the end.

And becomes 3-dimensional once finished! What a great ^ description, thanks I needed that today, going to look at those pics a tenth time hehe and go do another round in the backyard (can you scroll-up to my last post or 2nd-to-last post? I posted pics of a pad I just pruned in-keeping with what we're talking about here, I think, want to ensure I wasn't too aggressive before I do the rest of that canopy & then move-on to dozens of others I've done these past weeks!