What do I have?

I would keep the branch it turns into trimmed back until you cut the second trunk off. Even then, there's still a decent chance it could cause some inverse taper.
Tough call because it's in just the right spot to help heal the wound from chopping the second trunk, and for a lower branch like you said.

The one's down by the base are best for sacrifice branches that will help widen the base and might also balance against the potential reverse taper just mentioned, but I don't think they'd make a good part of the design.
 
ShadyStump said:
I would keep the branch it turns into trimmed back until you cut the second trunk off. Even then, there's still a decent chance it could cause some inverse taper.
Tough call because it's in just the right spot to help heal the wound from chopping the second trunk, and for a lower branch like you said.

The one's down by the base are best for sacrifice branches that will help widen the base and might also balance against the potential reverse taper just mentioned, but I don't think they'd make a good part of the design.
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The lowest growth, directly at the base, is absolutely going to be a sacrifice trunk... probably left to grow as it wants for a good minute. I intend to let that particular sacrifice leader grow as high as this tree has ever gotten before I consider cutting it. So at least a good meter (~3 feet) before I even think about touching it. It is there to fatten that @$$ up. "She gotta pack much back" -Sir Mix-a-Lot.

As for the bud exactly where I am going to chop my current sacrifice trunk? I'm liking the idea of making it a low branch on my main trunk. Allowing it to help heal the aforementioned chop, when I do remove the rest of that sacrifice trunk.

I have concerns about that branch turning into a vertical leader, though. I plan on tightening the radius of that main trunk... possibly even going full cascade... and the vertical nature of the Ash may just prioritize that branch to push for the sky as I arc the trunk over.
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DavidBoren said:
The lowest growth, directly at the base, is absolutely going to be a sacrifice trunk... probably left to grow as it wants for a good minute. I intend to let that particular sacrifice leader grow as high as this tree has ever gotten before I consider cutting it. So at least a good meter (~3 feet) before I even think about touching it. It is there to fatten that @$$ up. "She gotta pack much back" -Sir Mix-a-Lot.

As for the bud exactly where I am going to chop my current sacrifice trunk? I'm liking the idea of making it a low branch on my main trunk. Allowing it to help heal the aforementioned chop, when I do remove the rest of that sacrifice trunk.

I have concerns about that branch turning into a vertical leader, though. I plan on tightening the radius of that main trunk... possibly even going full cascade... and the vertical nature of the Ash may just prioritize that branch to push for the sky as I arc the trunk over.
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Pruning can help with that. So long as you don't let it take off, you can keep your selected trunk as the primary.

If you're planning to go that much further in the bend of your main trunk, you could attach some guy wires now and continue pulling it in the direction you want without having to worry about wire scares so much. Just tighten the wire a little now and again during the growing season. Use some sort of padding between the wire and the tree.
 
ShadyStump said:
Pruning can help with that. So long as you don't let it take off, you can keep your selected trunk as the primary.

If you're planning to go that much further in the bend of your main trunk, you could attach some guy wires now and continue pulling it in the direction you want without having to worry about wire scares so much. Just tighten the wire a little now and again during the growing season. Use some sort of padding between the wire and the tree.
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Like this?
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Yeah. I'd go with a bit more coverage with the padding. It helps prevent the the wire cutting in.
There are examples here and on YouTube, so look around and get some ideas how to use it.
 
What causes this?
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It looks like something is grazing on the top growth, but the local rabbits have usually left my Ash alone... plus, the top? Everything below is untouched. We don't have deer. There is a SMALL chance it was my cat... she eats random grass and $#!+, but I don't know. I don't see any bugs on the tree, other than a jumping spider that has shacked up in there.
 
If there are predators, there are prey.
Grasshopper or the like is my bet. Maybe a deer. They like the soft new growth when it's available.
 
There are grasshoppers about. Hmm... should I be worried? Is there a way to keep such agile insects off my tree?
 
Possible over-fertilization...? I flushed her with over 5 gallons of water over a 2 hour period a few days ago. Since then I have just been misting the leaves. She seems to powering through.

We will see...
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The combination of chlorosis and leaf curl makes me think nutrient deficiency. I'm no expert there, though.
 
Whatever it may have been, she seems to be making a decent recovery...
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I added a third wire to pull a branch down [to let light into some of this summer's new growth].
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Leaf nipping looks just like Deer grazing. Leaf blight on these common if winters not very cold. Is problem here largely staved off with diligent dormant fungicide treatments(especially buds)as well as on new growth. Personally use both Daconil, Copper spray alternately when not raining for a couple days so not washed off. Native Ash as well as potted are afflicted by this🤬. H2O spray on foliage not such hot idea as helps fungus grow.
 
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So I let this really low branch grow really long last year in an effort to thicken the trunk near the base of said branch. I was originally going to sacrifice the branch, but instead ending up wrapping it around the main trunk... spiraling/twisting the entire length. I let it sit like that all winter, and she has woken up in that shape.

Let's just call the original trunk of the ash tree "T1" and the sacrifice branch I ended up not sacrificing will be called "T2"... as the ash tree woke up and started producing foilage, I have started pairing branches from T1 with branches from T2. This fall/winter, I will wrap/twist these coupled branches together not unlike the trunks they grow from. These will become my future permenant structure.

Last month I added a lilac sapling... threaded it between the two ash trunks in a way that there is no "un-threading" it. They will dance together forever. This fall/winter, I will wrap the lilac around the trunk of the ash tree.

Next year I plan to wrap it all and wire it as one tree. My ultimate goal is for this all to fuse into a singular, gnarly tree.

Pics to follow...
 
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Hey! I almost forgot about this. Nice to see you back.

Bunching thin trunks like this isn't unknown in bonsai, but if you're looking to have them fuse together into one thick trunk, it can take a few years.
To increase your chances of success you want the trunks to hold tightly together, no chance of movement between them. If they can move or shift at all, that will keep them separate.
You might try some wire, or just string even, to tie them tight together.
 
I am pretty much just trying to get the lilac a strong start this year. I have been trimming the ash back to give the lilac full sun... have the whole pot facing the wrong way, just so the lilac gets full sun. My plan is still to eventually cascade it over the other side, so right now everything new on the ash is growing backwards... not a big deal, though. As long as the lilac gets a healthy introduction.

This fall, when the ash loses her leaves, I will spiral/twist the lilac around the other two... probably in the opposite direction as I wrapped T2 around T1. No wire or anything, just bending it around the trunk. Let the shape "set" over winter... along with all the twinned branches I twist together from T1 and T2.

Next spring/summer will see the pot turned around so everything is growing over the edge of the pot where I want it to cascade, towards the sun. Once everything proves to be healthy, I will worry about wrapping it up in the raffia stuff, and wiring it as if it was all one tree.

Might leave the wire on a little too long, just to promote a good squeeze between all the different ash and lilac trunks as they grow against the wire. I will definitely remove the wire before it's too late to do so, but each time I wire it, I will probably let the wire bite in a little bit... just to guarantee that same swelling is happening between the trunks, as well.

I'm not expecting this to be fully fused until ~2030... hopefully it doesn't take that long, but whatever, I'm not doing anything else with it. Lol. I've read about ash and lilac being grafted together, so I don't see why they can't be fused together.
 
DavidBoren said:
I am pretty much just trying to get the lilac a strong start this year. I have been trimming the ash back to give the lilac full sun... have the whole pot facing the wrong way, just so the lilac gets full sun. My plan is still to eventually cascade it over the other side, so right now everything new on the ash is growing backwards... not a big deal, though. As long as the lilac gets a healthy introduction.

This fall, when the ash loses her leaves, I will spiral/twist the lilac around the other two... probably in the opposite direction as I wrapped T2 around T1. No wire or anything, just bending it around the trunk. Let the shape "set" over winter... along with all the twinned branches I twist together from T1 and T2.

Next spring/summer will see the pot turned around so everything is growing over the edge of the pot where I want it to cascade, towards the sun. Once everything proves to be healthy, I will worry about wrapping it up in the raffia stuff, and wiring it as if it was all one tree.

Might leave the wire on a little too long, just to promote a good squeeze between all the different ash and lilac trunks as they grow against the wire. I will definitely remove the wire before it's too late to do so, but each time I wire it, I will probably let the wire bite in a little bit... just to guarantee that same swelling is happening between the trunks, as well.

I'm not expecting this to be fully fused until ~2030... hopefully it doesn't take that long, but whatever, I'm not doing anything else with it. Lol. I've read about ash and lilac being grafted together, so I don't see why they can't be fused together.
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I've not heard of that, but then I haven't worked on either as bonsai so haven't really researched them.

This will be a very interesting piece one way or another.
 
According to my lackluster research (mainly wikipedia), ash trees belong to the same family as lilac and olive and privet... Oleaceae/Oleeae... or whatever, not that any of those words mean anything to me, but I figured it's close enough for government work. Lol.

Government work is actually what led to my interest in ash trees to begin with. I got tired of mowing over this tree so I dug it up and put it in a pot. Learned it was an ash tree. Learned about the Emerald Ash Borer, which wasn't here in Oregon at the time... but I knew they were coming. I figured there HAD to be something we could do. Graft lilac.

Found a few academic papers on the subject of grafting lilac to ash. Wasn't willing to buy the PDF's but the summary of each provided me with enough encouragement to buy a lilac sapling on a whim. One of the three articles was skeptical due to different sap flow rates. Another paper quoted that one, and said it works fine regardless of differing sap flow rates. Data from the third article said it worked, and suggested the other two articles are talking about when the different trees "wake up" and go dormant when they refer to sap flow rates... not the speed of sap flowing, but when it actaully starts/stops flowing. Despite the two trees waking up and going dormant at completely different times/rates, grafting lilac to ash seemed to be successful in two of the three articles I found/read.

Again, good enough for me. Lol. In the name of science, it has begun. Assuming it is not just possible, but relatively easy to graft lilac to ash... we could do exactly that to a lot of ash trees, as many as possible, really. Yeah, the Emerald Ash Borer is still going to do its thing, and we will still probably have to remove the standing part of the tree... but the roots and stump could be left as a lilac bush if we grafted it into the base of the tree while it's still alive.

Eventually, the EAB menace will pass. Nature will adapt. There are ash trees in Thailand and/or Vietnam that produce more of some chemical all plants already produce/use... and the Emerald Ash Borer tends to leave them alone more than others. I think it's the same chemical that builds up in plants experiencing drought, but I'm too lazy to go back down that rabbit hole to try find that information again. So don't quote me on it. Lol.

And right when nature finds a way to deal with the Emerald Ash Borer, we will get hit with that core rot disease that is killing all the ash trees in Europe. Lol. Of it's not bugs from Asia, it's fungus from Europe. Apparently, god hates ash trees.
 
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