First off…if you’re reading this, you’ve hung through a break seemingly longer than AMC takes between seasons of their original series. Thank you. This has been a busy year of change and bonsai has been on the periphery at best. I’ll make a post on that at some point too, as I effectively took the year off any non-urgent bonsai tasks and it has been interesting to see what that does to a collection. I have been busy growing a new business, eking out a few summer trips, getting our daughter settled into her first apartment at college in Tampa, playing tennis with our son, running, etc. On top of it all, our daughter got engaged this month too. We are excited for her and her fiancé.
So….Here is where this story left off in October, 2020:
https://nebaribonsai.wordpress.com/2020/10/03/fall-work-on-an-arakawa-japanese-black-pine/
In Spring 2021, I adjusted some branches with guy-wires to tighten up the design.
This pine grows multiple buds from a single point, a strong one, and several weak ones. While candle-cutting, I am careful to also remove the weak shoots to ensure a second flush of new growth, rather than allowing the tree to sustain itself on the remaining weak shoots.
And now the tree will be allowed to regrow a second flush of shoots. I will only allow it to develop 2 shoots per terminal and hopefully avoid having weak shoots also appear.
October 2021, new growth is well underway. More needle pulling, and a little shoot selection. When the new shoots are hardened off, they can be wired.
I am strongly considering removing the first right branch and pushing all the movement to the left.
Next up, in November, I unwired the tree in preparation for fall work.
I took the tree to Bjorn’s in November and discussed removing the first right branch and setting movement toward the left. So off to work we went.
First up, the branch removed:
Next up, we addressed the stovepipe-straight section of upper trunk. I drew a couple lines were I would saw a wedge into the trunk and allow us to bend the trunk to create a little movement toward the left:
Fast-forward to mid-April, 2022 and the tree is growing. Not assured success just yet, but not a failure yet either. I decided to not repot and add stress. Next year, I can repot into the correct planting position.
Recently, Jeffrey Robson contacted me to share the Bonsai Society of Portland was posting a photo gallery of trees from Telperion Farms honoring Chris and Lisa Kirk’s contributions to the bonsai community. A photo of this tree will be included in this virtual show on May 14-15. The link for the show is here:
https://www.portlandbonsai.org
Fast forward another 5 months, and here is the tree in September 2022. No candle-cutting was done this summer, all wires are still on the tree. Later this fall, I’ll needle-pull to thin it out, remove tight wires and add new where they’re needed.
Nebari Bonsai 
I never knew you could do this to a tree, and it didn’t seem to mind!
Outstanding!
looks like it made it. nice! that wedge was huge! i figured you’d ditch that 1st branch eventually. you’ve got good asthetic taste 👍
Reblogged this on Wolf's Birding and Bonsai Blog.