how soon should i start pruning away unwanted branches?

[thailand-steve]

i put this juniper in this really cool rock. i hollowed out the inside so there is quite a lot of space in there for the roots, about as much as an 8" pot

i want the tree to bulk up a lot because right now its dwarfed by the rock a bit so i'm wondering how much, if any pruning i should do now.

i have a good number of strong branches coming of the main trucks which will ultimately be all that i want from the main trunk, but i'm not sure if i should remove all the small stuff between the main branches now so the tree can focus its energy on the keeper branches, or just leave it as is to beef up the main trunk?

what do you think juniper gods?

thx steve

 

[Smoke]

Keeping everything will grow the trunk larger faster. Everytime you cut it will stall.

Leave it alone for best results. Even with good growth, trunk will be slow to thicken without room for the roots to elongate.

 

[JudyB]

Hey, have you thought about using the other pockets on that rock, and doing a multi tree planting? Then scale for a single tree could be closer to what you already have. And I think it'd look cool with multiple trees...
Just a thought.

 

[thailand-steve]

Hey, have you thought about using the other pockets on that rock, and doing a multi tree planting? Then scale for a single tree could be closer to what you already have. And I think it'd look cool with multiple trees...
Just a thought.

i'm just not that big a fan of multi tree bonsai, forest bonsai, just a personal taste thing.

although i was looking at a lot of trees in rock pots from a bonsai show in Viet Nam I think and realized its not necessary to have the tree bigger than the rock always