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Coast live oak – initial styling

July 12, 2019 by Jonas Dupuich

Back in March I posted photos of several coast live oaks after cutting off all major branches (see “Reducing branches on coast live oak – follow-up“).

The trees have grown vigorously since then. So much so, they were ready for their first styling last month. The goal was to select primary branches and begin setting bends close to the trunk. Lower branches were left long to thicken while the upper branches were cut back to encourage ramification.

This work was completed by students enrolled in my spring Development Intensive. After selecting the fronts noted in the “after” photos, class participants pruned the trees and started on the wiring. Here is what the trees looked like before and after this work.

Coast live oak before cutback and wiring

Tree #1

Coast live oak after cutback and wiring

Tree #1 – after cutback and wiring

Coast live oak before cutback and wiring

Tree #2

Coast live oak after cutback and wiring

Tree #2 – after cuback and wiring

Coast live oak before cutback and wiring

Tree #3

Coast live oak after cutback and wiring

Tree #3 – after cuback and wiring

Coast live oak before cutback and wiring

Tree #4

Coast live oak after cutback and wiring

Tree #4 – after cuback and wiring

Coast live oak before cutback and wiring

Tree #5

Coast live oak after cutback and wiring

Tree #5 – after cuback and wiring

In the past few weeks since the trees were pruned last month, all have produced new buds and some new shoots have elongated several inches. I’ll let the trees grow through summer and look to prune them again toward the end of the year.

Upcoming intensives have been scheduled for this summer and fall. For more information, click here.

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Filed Under: Bonsai Development Tagged With: Coast Live Oak

Previous Post: « Bonsai displays at the Bay Area Suiseki and Shohin Show
Next Post: Directional pruning – a tip from Andrew Robson »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Ray says

    July 12, 2019 at 6:43 am

    Looking forward to see the growth and styling next year. They are growing well

    • Jonas Dupuich says

      July 12, 2019 at 9:04 am

      Thanks Ray!

  2. Michael says

    July 12, 2019 at 3:32 pm

    Sutin would be impressed! I love being able to back-walk the progress. It’s magical.
    Thanks again,
    Michael

  3. Doug Kinzey says

    July 13, 2019 at 4:50 pm

    Nice trees. I have followed your posts on these since February 2019. I find it very informative to see how you are developing them.

    Do you know how long these had been developed as bonsai before you obtained them? Also, I presume these were collected with fairly large trunks originally?

    Thanks, I really enjoy all your posts.

    – Doug

    • Jonas Dupuich says

      July 13, 2019 at 9:16 pm

      Thanks Doug – I appreciate it! The four smaller oaks are about 30 years old from acorn. The larger tree may be older. They were raised as bonsai but hadn’t been worked on for some time. They’ve been a lot of fun to work on!

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