Styling Advice (Gold Star Juniper)

[bonsai928]

Hello all!

In a few days, I'll be putting this Gold Star Juniper into the basket it is sitting in most likely doing some root work in the process.

I'm wondering if:
1. Is it okay if I do any pre-styling on this?
2. Any styling tips/advice for this particular plant?

I'm worried if I leave as is I'll end up with a bad taper.

Thanks!

 

[cheap_walmart_art]

I see nobody has chimed in yet. I figure today is the day I’ll flood the chats this month. Anyway, if you’re going to repot and do root work, I wouldn’t do much beyond cleaning up the top (cut some of those branches dangling straight down, clean out crotch growth, dead growth). Keep up with aftercare and then fertilize the heck out of it this summer and fall and style it next year.

 

[bonsai928]

I see nobody has chimed in yet. I figure today is the day I’ll flood the chats this month. Anyway, if you’re going to repot and do root work, I wouldn’t do much beyond cleaning up the top (cut some of those branches dangling straight down, clean out crotch growth, dead growth). Keep up with aftercare and then fertilize the heck out of it this summer and fall and style it next year.

Thank you for your advice! That is what I was assuming. Although I am still curious when it comes time to style this how to go about it with a branch formation like this one.

 

[cheap_walmart_art]

Thank you for your advice! That is what I was assuming. Although I am still curious when it comes time to style this how to go about it with a branch formation like this one.

Preface this advice with the fact I’ve never personally grown this cultivar. That being said, this looks like a variety of juniper that is going to have spindly and leggy growth rather than the mounding style of growth we would rather see on junipers. On these, I would pick a couple of the healthy young whips and try to bend them back on themselves some to compact their look and give the illusion of mounding growth.

It’s hard to see from your photos but most of your main branches look to be pretty thick and straight from the trunk, which also looks pretty straight. Hopefully when you repot and dig down you will find some bend, look to repot the tree with an eye to get the best movement you can. This may take spinning the trunk, and rotating the trunk on a Z axis.

I marked the branching that might have potential with blue and the only main branch I think you should go ahead and remove prior to repot in red.

Feel absolutely free to ignore all of this advice (refer back to the first sentence)

 

[Jrmcmich]

I only hand 2 junipers so limited knowledge but adding twisting to branches is usually recommended. One of mine is fairly easy to do that and other is more brittle but still was able to do some twisting on both