Boulevard (Blue Moss) Cypress, Chamaecyparis pisifera 'Boulevard' in development

[coh]

Here is a boulevard cypress I've been working on for a while. It has an interesting history which I'll show in the second post.

Current photo - after some branch removal, thinning, wiring and pinching. Still have to select a few additional branches for removal. Doesn't appear this dense in person, somehow the photo seems to compress everything together. These are a little tough to work on - being chamaecyparis (like hinoki), they are not particularly fond of backbudding on old branches or the trunk (I may have to resort to grafting on some of these branches). These are one of my favorite plants to work with - the soft aromatic bluish foliage is really pleasant. They grow rapidly and aggressively and require frequent thinning and pinching of the growing tips. Wire can bite in quickly.



Trunk base has developed nicely.

 

[coh]

Now for the history. I acquired this tree from a local nursery almost 10 years ago. It was after my last work trip out to California. We were based in the Monterey region, so I'd always take some time to explore the Monterey and Big Sur areas. Was always fascinated by the structures of the coastal cypress trees, like these:



So I was looking for material that could be made into this kind of tree. This particular boulevard cypress had a trunk structure that I thought would work. So I bought it and chopped it up and put some wire on it and wound up with this as a starting point. This is from 2011:



A year later it looked like this (2012):



I had no idea what I was doing. Now I know a lot more about flat top tree structures and styling, so if I had this tree in front of me I might have a shot at developing something decent. But back then, I realized I was out of my league and decided to just chop off those 2 main branches and see what might sprout off the trunk. The next photo is from 2013:



Fortunately I had not previously removed all the trunk growth and in addition, the tree exploded with new shoots all over the trunk. I guess the shock of having most of the foliage removed along with the amount of sun getting inside helped. I basically just let it grow for a couple of years. Next photo is 2015. Here I had started restraining some of the upper branches while letting the lower ones run to thicken. You can see how the trunk has thickened.



Last sequence photo is from 2016. By this point I'm definitely working on keeping branch length restrained. I don't have any additional photos worth showing, but between this and the current tree I allowed the top to run for a while so I could create a jin feature.

In some ways I wish I'd stuck with the original plan but it probably would have been a disaster as I had no idea how to develop the image I had in mind. I like the way it has turned out, though.

 

[HorseloverFat]

Coooool

Nice work!!!

Do you ever miss the absurdity of that sacrifice branch? I mean like when it’s sitting on your bench, are you, now, thinking, “I miss that weird, branchy friend.” Or are you more, “Thank GOD I finally cut that thing off!”?

 

[BobbyLane]

Very nice progression, from the 2011 pic it didnt seem possible.
after taxus, spruce and cypress are probably my favourite conifers.

 

[Crazy Diamond]

Awesome tree with a humble origin, anyone can get one of theese in a nursery very cheap and in a few years get something really cool

 

[Hartinez]

When you said you were going to post the story, I didn’t see the original image coming! Great progression and tree! The trunk and base in particular are very nice. Thank goodness it budded on the trunk when you chopped! A part of me feels like it could use some Jin or Shari. Have you considered killing off a branch or two at some point?

 

[coh]

When you said you were going to post the story, I didn’t see the original image coming! Great progression and tree! The trunk and base in particular are very nice. Thank goodness it budded on the trunk when you chopped! A part of me feels like it could use some Jin or Shari. Have you considered killing off a branch or two at some point?

I hadn't looked at that original photo in years...while I obviously had some memory of the initial "styling", it was still shocking to see!

There is some jin in there, you just can't see it because the foliage is too dense and the lighting isn't very good. I'll probably add some more when I decide which branch(es) to remove. The stubs from the 2 original sub-trunks are still buried in there too, I have to carve them at some point. There's also an old jin stub below the apex...I had killed off the original apex and brought up a branch to replace the original at some point. This added some movement which again, can't really be seen in the pic.

 

[Carol 83]

Seeing where this tree started out and where it is today, is pretty inspiring.