Need help with my ponderosa pine

[Pine_nut]

Hello all,

I acquired this collected ponderosa pine in September from my local club auction. It was in it’s second year after being collected. It has been going down hill ever since. Can someone with ponderosa experience tell me what may be wrong with it and what is the best course of action to try to get it on the mend?

It’s in pumice. I have not done any pruning, wiring or repotting since I’ve had it. Only watering and fertilizing. I haven’t fertilized yet this spring since I don’t know if that would harm it further at this point.

It keeps dropping needles that are not very old, and the ones that are still on look pretty dull and drab. Some turning yellow or just very light green. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Colorado]

The tree is extremely weak. See the needles from 2 years ago, how long they are?

Then you can see that last year it barely put out any needles at all, and the ones it did put out are very short. Too short for a healthy pondo. I can’t tell from the pictures what the culprit is. Almost surely though, it is either over watering or under watering.

This tree is on the brink of life or death. Any bonsai work this year will probably be a death sentence.

Put it in the sunniest spot in your garden, water it properly (do not over water), and fertilize heavily. This is not the time for Ponderosa refinement techniques, I.e waiting until fall to fertilize.

Good luck!

 

[sorce]

How much do you water?

I wonder how much they water them in pumice.

I feel like even though it holds a lot of water, it doesn't exchange well, seems like it dries from the outside fast and doesn't give up any water.

I'd guess they're watering them automatically and frequently.

No likey pumice.
It's just glaze material!

Sorce

 

[Pine_nut]

The tree is extremely weak. See the needles from 2 years ago, how long they are?

Then you can see that last year it barely put out any needles at all, and the ones it did put out are very short. Too short for a healthy pondo. I can’t tell from the pictures what the culprit is. Almost surely though, it is either over watering or under watering.

This tree is on the brink of life or death. Any bonsai work this year will probably be a death sentence.

Put it in the sunniest spot in your garden, water it properly (do not over water), and fertilize heavily. This is not the time for Ponderosa refinement techniques, I.e waiting until fall to fertilize.

Good luck!

I’m checking the soil an 1/2”-1” down and watering when drying out.
thanks for the advice!

 

[Pine_nut]

I just ran across this old thread and thought I would update it. The tree is doing well. It limped along for the remainder of 2021. Then in 2022 it started pushing some vigorous, long needles so I planned to repot it in spring 2023.

It does have some bad reverse taper, probably because it was growing out of a rock crevice for so long. I’m planning to create some kind of a rock planting around the base to give it the look of the original growing location and to cover that narrow base.

For now, I’m happy that I’ve found a better design/planting angle for the top of the tree. I wasn’t crazy about the “airplane wing” look of the branches originally.

 

[chicago1980]

I just ran across this old thread and thought I would update it. The tree is doing well. It limped along for the remainder of 2021. Then in 2022 it started pushing some vigorous, long needles so I planned to repot it in spring 2023.

It does have some bad reverse taper, probably because it was growing out of a rock crevice for so long. I’m planning to create some kind of a rock planting around the base to give it the look of the original growing location and to cover that narrow base.

For now, I’m happy that I’ve found a better design/planting angle for the top of the tree. I wasn’t crazy about the “airplane wing” look of the branches originally.

Excellent to see this update.

 

[CaptainFuzzy]

How’s it doing?

 

[Pine_nut]

How’s it doing?

Thanks for asking! It’s doing well. It pushed a bunch of new buds this year. I took it to a workshop I did with Bjorn in May and styled it. He recommended to jin the left branch and consider grafting on black pine in the future. I think spring 2025 I will work on grafting it. I’ve never been super impressed with the foliage on it but the trunk and bark are pretty awesome.

Here’s a picture of it today.

 

[Pine_nut]

I realized I never shared what the tree looked like when I got it. Here’s a photo from September 2020. What’s left of the tree today is from the branch and foliage on the right side. The whole left side has been removed and turned into jin.