JWP fallen needles...Question??

rmuniz007

Hello,

I have a beautiful JWP that is about 50 years old. I recently did some pruning and styling late last month. Anyways, my question is that I know that JWP will drop its old needles during this time which is normal. However, how much needle dropping is considered normal. I have a few JWP's and the one that I just prunned and style has drop a lot more then my other JWP. There is still a lot of foliage, but I was suprise how many has dropped.

Second question: Branches that have buds, but no needles will eventually bud in the spring, right? I have a few branches that have dropped all its needles, but most already have buds on it..

any feedback would be greatly appreicated it...

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TreeBay

Sounds like you are pruning and styling at the wrong time. Beginning around october you'll see at least the 3 year old and many of the two year old needles at the base of the branches turn color and fall off. They may remain sort of in place because the White Pine has short bristles that can tend to capture other dead leaves, but if you take a hemp bristle broom to it you should be able to clean it right up.

If you had been practicing a more timely pruning & training, many of these would have been plucked away in the months preceding to allow light and air to penetrate into the tree.

Japanese white pine candles are usually pinched as they develop at the time around the point at which the candles still have that bumpy appearance, well before the needles push out into fascicles; that might be march-may depending on where you are, but definitely late spring. You'd get another round of bud development as a result of that pinching back and would select from among those buds, and the work of bud selection would be "done" by summertime.

Dead needles or yellowing needles at branch tips would be indicative of a problem, like root rot.

If this was a recent import, (as in less than 5 years) I would be very careful with it. The trees come in very strong for the first couple of years based on stored reserves, but the loss of feeder roots, change in soil and bare rooting results in stripping away the hyphae of mycorhizzae that nourish the plant. All this can put it into a tailspin within 5 years if conditions like drainage and fertilization are not spot on perfect.

Regards,

Matt

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