Bonsai Tonight

An educational website about bonsai development

Why we decandle pine bonsai

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Sometimes the reasons why we decandle pine bonsai can get lost in the discussion of how we decandle. In short, decandling is the single-most important technique used to develop beautiful pine bonsai.

Black pine

Black pine exhibited at the 2011 Taikan-ten

Why decandle red and black pine bonsai?

  1. To stimulate back budding. The stress caused by removing spring growth can activate dormant or adventitious buds on woody growth. Back buds – buds that develop not at the ends of branches but from within the tree’s interior – allow us to maintain the size and shape of our trees. Without them, bonsai would grow larger and larger each year.
  2. To increase branch density. Decandling adds density by replacing single spring shoots with multiple summer shoots. Decandling further increases density by stimulating adventitious buds at the base of spring candles – barren areas that don’t typically produce buds. And as summer shoots are usually smaller than spring shoots, internodes are further reduced yielding more refined ramification.
  3. To regulate vigor. Decandling is a useful technique for keeping new growth on pine bonsai in check.
  4. To promote balance. Various decandling techniques can be used to decrease vigor in strong areas and increase vigor in weak areas to improve overall balance.
  5. To reduce needle size. Red and black pine bonsai are at their most beautiful when the needle size is a good fit for the tree. Decandling can let us produce short needles on small trees and larger needles on larger trees.

Up next week – how to prepare trees for decandling.

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Comments

  1. I like this series. It is a good distillation of several things that I’ve read, but were scattered among many sources.

  2. Can’t wait till next week for the 2nd part. I would also like to know if mugo’s and scot’s are treated the same.

  3. Paul, scots are treated like J. white pine(single growth pine). Mugos should be treated similarly I believe. Both differ from japanese white pine in that they are more vigorous. Because they are more vigorous, you CAN decandle and force buds to develop at the tips, but I dont believe backbudding will occur(i havent noticed much). Both species naturally have much smaller needles than japanese black pines, so the primary objective with them is to maintain shape and develop interior buds. Anyways, why read what i have to say, when you can go watch ryan neil’s videos on pines! He does a pretty good job of explaining. Just remember which pines are single flush and which ones produce two flushes, then treat each group accordingly.

    Sweet series, Jonas.

  5. I have found that decandling Scots results in a huge number of buds at the base of the cut off shoot. Unfortunately, they do not develop into shoots even if they are reduced to two. They try, but end up as distorted needle clumps that do not produce a new bud. Instead, I cut the shoots back short which results in a great deal of back budding – sometimes that year, but mostly the next year.

    • Hi Ari – thuja are treated more like hinoki or juniper. When we remove the most vigorous shoots the goal is stimulate the remaining foliage.

  7. Jonas, I have a JBP in the ground. It’s a small one, 10″ big, and I want to grow it out for a larger tree and a larger trunk. The spring candles are like 4″ long now. I think I shouldn’t decandle and let it all grow out untouched until I get the desired size. Am I wrong? Should I decandle now so I keep the buds close to the trunk, or let it grow out? Thanks!!

  8. Hi Chris, fun project – sounds like you’re on the right track. Generally I’d wait until digging the tree before I start decandling. Decandling trees in the ground can produce more vigorous summer growth – good for landscape trees, but less useful for bonsai. For the most part, I focus on developing the trunk during this phase, but it’s ok to cut or cut-back selected branches to maintain some small growth in the area where future branches will develop. Good question!

  9. Thank You Jonas! I appreciate the excellent explanation. Good idea to selectively prune future branching sites.

  12. If I have a refined corkbark black pine that had scale last year and is not at it’s most vigorous, however it does need balancing in the buds as only the upper candles have extended far this spring. Lower branches are weak and may die back if energy is not balanced. Would you decandle the top buds only and leave the bottom buds alone? Or would you not decandle and just tilt the tree severely off and on all summer since it had a stressful fall last year dealing with insects?

    Thanks!
    Brian

    • Hi Brian – great question. If it doesn’t weaken the tree too much, removing just the strong buds is a good technique for balancing vigor. That said, I’d hesitate to remove the only vigorously growing shoots on the tree. I’d go by your past experience with the tree or input from experienced people in your area. Could also be a good question for a forum like http://bonsaistudygroup.com/