Jeffs Pinus - Bungeana / Lacebark - from seed progression

[JeffS73]

I've been growing Pinus Bungeana from seed since 2021, I thought I'd create a thread to document their progress.

On my trip to Japan this year ('24), we visited Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden (we were staying in Shinjuku for our Tokyo leg). One of the things that gave me reason to be hopeful was this tree:





What got me excited was this:



The needles were about 1-2 inches long almost all over. Other examples were more rangy:




But the fact was, that one tree gave me hope that my own specimens could attain small enough needles for bonsai.

On another note, I can confirm other Bnutters experience that they take 10 years to start barking up. That's what I observed in Shinjuku.

 

[JeffS73]

Today I was out tidying and wiring the '21 lacebarks.

It was good to see that in general, the candle cutting I did in mid May resulted in either 2 or 3 buds or new candles in the same year:




Trees kept in larger pond baskets have definitely taken the lead on size, 1in wide trunks at 3 years old in 8in pond baskets:

 

[JeffS73]

This is a little backwards, but these pics are from mid May when I cut the candles. In some cases I removed the candles completely, in others I cut them in half. May might seem early but in the North of the UK, we have a fairly short growing season.



The colour of the candle stems can also be pretty wild.

 

[Bonsai Nut]

I like it! These are very hard to come across in the US. I have two cultivars - but they have ugly grafts.

 

[JeffS73]

I like it! These are very hard to come across in the US. I have two cultivars - but they have ugly grafts.

Ah, that's a shame! They're easy to germinate and do the seedling cutting technique on, so you just need a motivated supplier. That's the long game though. Never seen the Japanese use them either.