Dawn Redwood I put in the ground to “thicken up” is huge. Now what?

[Srt8madness]

A few months would put it at fall/winter. Perfect time to relocate it! It might help to chop a few feet off when you move it, but since you want a trunk 3 times thicker you'll want to keep as much as possible and grow on from there. The base should be done before you chop to the height of the first segment. So 10 years base chop, 3-4 years middle section chop, and a couple years for the apex. After all segments are roughly chopped leave for a year or two to recover and faster healing in a training pot or ground. To give a rough idea of how it works. Ideally...

???

 

[karen82]

I dug a dawn redwood almost that size this spring. It wasn't too bad except the taproot - you are lucky that your tap root is probably contained in the pot. Like other deciduous, it will handle being dug up best while dormant, early spring is best but late fall would probably be ok if you really need it out of the way to work on the deck (assuming you don't get really cold winters there).
Mine is not as vigorous a grower as dawn redwoods usually are, but it survived being dug up, barerooted, root pruned including sawing off the taproot, and chopped down to about 18" (I left some small branches to be safe) before being replanted in the same spot.

 

[Icarus]

No worries to get the trunk to taper you need foliage.

When I cut mine the trunk simply stopped growing

 

[Cajunrider]

I have some questions on this - First, why cut at the end of the growing season? I generally make all major cuts before or during the growing season so the growth can help with healing and prevent dieback. Is there something different about sequoias? Second, what is the purpose of staging the chops? Redwoods are some of the toughest trees I've worked with and can be severely reduced in one go. I have zero hesitance lopping off over 7 feet from my 8 footer, especially if there is a branch there. Should I be hesitant? I know folks will severely reduce the tree and roots in one go with no hesitation on this species. With a healthy root system, especially growing in the ground, I am working on the assumption this could even be cut down further.

I am in your camp. I will not chop before heading into dormant period. No matter how healthy, the tree has no way to heal the chop. As with any living system, opening a wound at a time of weakness is a no no in my book.

 

[Cajunrider]

I have to disagree at cutting it to 5'. There is really no reason to do so on this species, unless you want the final height to be 7'+.

The purpose of a chop is to introduce taper, and/or to start building out the apex.

Envision how tall you want the final tree, and chop below that point.

I agree. If I want the final height to be 32" I will make my first chop at 10-11" and subsequent chop at shorter and shorter lengths until I get to 27". The final 5" is for the leaf canopy.

 

[Icarus]

Check out 'all things bonsai' they advise late autumn, winter pruning and explain their reasons.

At the end of the day it's your tree do what suits you best.

Let's compare photos in a few years.

 

[Icarus]

One I did earlier

 

[dbonsaiw]

One I did earlier

Good luck getting that stump in a pot. LOL.

 

[Maiden69]

First... I browsed through the thread.

Second... I have no experience with D.Redwoods, but I have a little experience with bald cypress and from my understanding they are slightly similar.

I think the first thing you need to do is to figure out what you want your tree to look like. A slender natural/young looking tree?






Or a very old and gnarly heavy super tapered tree?

I'll add pictures later, the forum is giving me errors while trying to load them right now.

Also, another consideration is pot... a pot for a big tree, especially one with a very wide base is not cheap. Even the Chinese cheaper pots for a big tree can cost over $250, and mica pots over $100.

I think that right now you are at a good size for a more youthful kind of tree, and you could even air-layer branches, or even the top portion of the tree and get multiple trees out of this one. I don't think, though, that you will be able to achieve the super heavy base tree without some kind of flooding, or a very open substrate with a lot of watering. It rarely happen in the ground unless the area floods, or there is a lot of underground water and the roots are allowed to grow long without restriction.

 

[Ininaatigoons]

Speaking on pots... Pots are for finished bonsai. Since bonsai are never truely finished no pot is necessary. Save the hundreds of dollars, get some 1x4 or 1x6 and grow in a training pot. You can make it as fancy as you want and save the bonsai pots for finished bonsai.

 

[Bonsai Forest]

One I did earlier

Can’t wait to see the taper in this tree a thousand years from now.

 

[Ininaatigoons]

It's gonna be awesome!

 

[Maiden69]

Here are the other images.

 

[fossiliferous]

Thank you all so much for your responses. For some reason I didn’t see notifications that anyone had been responding and thought nobody had! it has been a busy end of summer with my kids starting school. I was looking at it today and kind of panicking and I thought I would check here out of desperation and lo and behold, everybody has weighed in!
In the previous month, it has grown even more. Big growth spurt. I can no longer reach quite around the base. It’s thicker than my wrist now, and it grew over two feet in height!
I hope that some of the roots are contained in that pot thing, but I’m sure it has escaped at this point for it to be thriving like this. Even if I were to just let it grow into a full size tree it could never stay that close to the house. The flower bed was supposed to be temporary.
I figured I would move it into a nursery pot before it got as big as it is now. I figured the growth will slow mightily as soon as I put it in a bonsai pot, although for now, I might put it into a nursery pot until I get it closer to how I want it.
It grew a lot faster than I expected. Everything else I’m growing is much slower. It’s glorious but also took my noob self by surprise.
I need to cut it asap, but I am afraid to cut it down to below my ultimate height yet because I’m concerned about it surviving. There’s a bare section in the middle around the height of my railing where the kids harvested branches and leaves from it. It has to be able to survive a bit of abuse.
It’s kind of hard to tell from my pictures, but the lower two or 3 feet of the trunk are not actually stick straight. There is a gentle curve to it. I love the look of an old gnarled thing. I am concerned though if it gets any bigger (even if not for the deck renovation soon) physically I’m going to have trouble getting it out of the ground.
Heck, I’ve already going to have trouble getting it out of the ground.
i gave myself a bit of a fright, digging down into the pot to see what it was doing under there this morning. When it was a wee twig my kids must have buried some surprise plastic dinosaur skeletons and I thought I was running across a more modern reptile that crawled in there and died!

It looks a lot thicker down near the bottom. Maybe cool nebari. I want to uncover a bit more; will need to to see what I am working with.

 

[fossiliferous]

I'd agree with the trunk chop while in ground. No competing overgrowth so it should be good to grow out another leader and branching.

FWIW, such strong growth indicates to me that the tree has root (s) that have escaped into the ground. That means you're likely to have big dominant downward growing roots (or possibly one root) to deal with and develop when this is dug up.

Thank you. It has to have escaped, I agree. I think I’m going to do the trunk chop as soon as I can while still in the ground and try for cuttings for more trees for funsies. There’s no date set for the deck yet and I highly doubt it’s going to be happening at this point in the next couple of months. Average first frost here is in early November. So there would still be some growing season time left for it to start healing up.
When I do have to move it, do you have any advice about how to deal with a deep taproot that has escaped?

 

[Ininaatigoons]

This is not one I'm very experienced with, but... They grow easily from layers and cuttings. I'm sure that they are forgiving. Always best chance is dormant. Always take as much root as possible, because you can always work on them later. Always put in super airy soil mix. Green Spagnum Moss, Peat/perlite, Bonsai soil...

 

[rockm]

Thank you. It has to have escaped, I agree. I think I’m going to do the trunk chop as soon as I can while still in the ground and try for cuttings for more trees for funsies. There’s no date set for the deck yet and I highly doubt it’s going to be happening at this point in the next couple of months. Average first frost here is in early November. So there would still be some growing season time left for it to start healing up.
When I do have to move it, do you have any advice about how to deal with a deep taproot that has escaped?

Now is NOT the time to collect it/ Springtime before it leafs out is the best time. Get a battery-powered reciprocating saw, like a sawzall and three pruning blades. Dig down enough one one side to see four inches of the tap, saw it loose (three blades is in case you break a few which happens).

 

[namnhi]

Thank you all so much for your responses. For some reason I didn’t see notifications that anyone had been responding and thought nobody had! it has been a busy end of summer with my kids starting school. I was looking at it today and kind of panicking and I thought I would check here out of desperation and lo and behold, everybody has weighed in!
In the previous month, it has grown even more. Big growth spurt. I can no longer reach quite around the base. It’s thicker than my wrist now, and it grew over two feet in height!
I hope that some of the roots are contained in that pot thing, but I’m sure it has escaped at this point for it to be thriving like this. Even if I were to just let it grow into a full size tree it could never stay that close to the house. The flower bed was supposed to be temporary.
I figured I would move it into a nursery pot before it got as big as it is now. I figured the growth will slow mightily as soon as I put it in a bonsai pot, although for now, I might put it into a nursery pot until I get it closer to how I want it.
It grew a lot faster than I expected. Everything else I’m growing is much slower. It’s glorious but also took my noob self by surprise.
I need to cut it asap, but I am afraid to cut it down to below my ultimate height yet because I’m concerned about it surviving. There’s a bare section in the middle around the height of my railing where the kids harvested branches and leaves from it. It has to be able to survive a bit of abuse.
It’s kind of hard to tell from my pictures, but the lower two or 3 feet of the trunk are not actually stick straight. There is a gentle curve to it. I love the look of an old gnarled thing. I am concerned though if it gets any bigger (even if not for the deck renovation soon) physically I’m going to have trouble getting it out of the ground.
Heck, I’ve already going to have trouble getting it out of the ground.
i gave myself a bit of a fright, digging down into the pot to see what it was doing under there this morning. When it was a wee twig my kids must have buried some surprise plastic dinosaur skeletons and I thought I was running across a more modern reptile that crawled in there and died!

It looks a lot thicker down near the bottom. Maybe cool nebari. I want to uncover a bit more; will need to to see what I am working with.

This tree must be a few hundred meters wide based on the two dinosaurs fossilized skeletons.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

Now is NOT the time to collect it/ Springtime before it leafs out is the best time. Get a battery-powered reciprocating saw, like a sawzall and three pruning blades. Dig down enough one one side to see four inches of the tap, saw it loose (three blades is in case you break a few which happens).

Absolutely right on the mark.


That’s just what we do except we use a cheap Japanese foldiing saw and the trees are potted. In fact every spring we cut right through the rootballs of 4 redwoods and a zelkova for the fourth time and the saw never broke.

Cheers
DSD sends

 

[snowman04]

Puts my little sprig to shame... Watching this with interest!