bnsaijim

The loaded question "Will the tree live?" has been asked several times at demos I've attended. Definitely damned if you do and damned if you...

TB-

The goal is not "the show" per se- I don't think entertainment is ever the express purpose. As I somewhat facetiously pointed out there are at least two different flavors- "technique" and "design".

Design simply makes for much better entertainment because hopefully by desert but definitely by after-dinner cocktail rounds we have something wonderous to oggle over. The raffle committee can then relieve our wallets of excess heft in that narrow window between when our beer goggles are in full filter mode and our bodies begin the hotel food rejection process...

Now how the heck are you gonna raffle off a stump?

One of the best demos I've seen was by Dennis Makashima on a boxwood. He took off about 30% of the branching because the history of the tree was unclear, laid out out the training goals for the next 5 years and left it to the raffle winner to carry out the vision and keep the tree alive... I think I learned more in that 90 minutes than all other sessions combined...

Jim
TX