bnsaijim

Unfortunately, while it may sound easy, this is all an "ideal system". Each person's mileage may vary for any given tree.

Fred,

Why exactly do you want to pinch candles? What is your goal for this year- what do you expect to see it do in response?

Specific techniques are done in a particular way and at a particular time to yield a given result.

The other consideration is that you would not want to go through a full gamut of training techniques on these pines. Pines don't recover even nearly as quickly as deciduous trees.

Strong budding can occur from a final surge in response to trauma i.e., collecting- blowing all it's reserves in a last ditch attempt to survive. If you tax the tree you may lose it. You think it's doing well - it's budding, right?- so you do all your techniques - candle pinching, wiring, needle pulling, and then you wonder why it' doesn't wake up next spring...

I have about a 6" high pile of references and notes on training JBP's. A cookbook approach is a good place to start but following what the tree is telling you will produce superior results.

I have a few hundred in various size pots, in the ground, different ages and stages of development, each with a different "plan". Specifically, I have "prepotensai" - stock that I'm working on getting branches within the first 4". Many of these have popped numerous low buds. These may be viable, may not be, BUT I do know that if I wait till August to candle the strong top, the low buds will be dead.

Lastly, most American species of pine are best handled as "weaker" versions of black pines - same techniques, just less rigorous application...

Evergreen Gardenworks has two excellent articles on this topic...

Hope my different take is of some help...

Jim Stone
TX