no buds after decandling

[Joe Dupre']

I'm new to pines and haven't been through my first spring and summer with mine. My friend told me he pruned the candles on an in-ground black pine and he didn't get any new buds this past summer and fall. I've seen the tree, and it looks decently healthy and has a 2 foot tall sacrifice branch which is growing well. The bottom part of the tree is not doing as well. Any ideas?

 

[River's Edge]

What type of black pine is your friends? Not all black pines are double flush, and not all pines in ground that appear healthy are vigorous enough to respond well to decandling. The other consideration is the time of year the candles were removed, that will affect the timing for recovery and development of new buds.
If the tree is healthy it should respond with new buds developing this winter and progress next growing season.

 

[Joe Dupre']

I have no idea what variety of black pine he has. He was told by local very capable bonsai enthusiasts to decandle in early June, which he did. I suspect the tree was not QUITE as healthy as he said it was. He does have a habit of "doing bonsai things" to trees that might not be up to it.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

I've had black pines stall a new bud formation and consecutive flush until late spring.

If the bottom half is losing vigor, I would think about removing the sacrifice branch. In my mind it would divert the tree from investing whatever is left into the most viable part, and instead put that energy into the bottom part.
I don't know for sure if that's a good idea. But it has crossed my mind in one of my scots pines that wasn't doing well. I didn't chop it, but I'm worried that I'm about to lose the whole compactly developed part.

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

Any photos of the tree?

 

[SeanS]

I've had black pines stall a new bud formation and consecutive flush until late spring.

If the bottom half is losing vigor, I would think about removing the sacrifice branch. In my mind it would divert the tree from investing whatever is left into the most viable part, and instead put that energy into the bottom part.
I don't know for sure if that's a good idea. But it has crossed my mind in one of my scots pines that wasn't doing well. I didn't chop it, but I'm worried that I'm about to lose the whole compactly developed part.

If you don’t want to remove the sacrifice completely it’s also a good idea to remove some vigour from the upper sacrifice areas by cutting off any extra shoots and pull needles from the sacrifice. You could even decandle the sacrifice to try balance the energy across the tree, Jonas had documented doing that on his blog. He states that this is a good technique for when you are close to removing the sacrifice but aren’t quite ready to remove it all together. This will obviously slow down the thickening that you’re trying to produce from the sacrifice but won’t stop it all together like removing it would.

 

[Joe Dupre']

Any photos of the tree?

Sorry, no photos. I did see the tree a couple of times and the bottom section seemed to be doing OK.