Apathetik

Styling help:

I am at a bit of a lose on what to do with this guy. I have the idea in my head on what I want it to look like, but not sure how to get there. My success with conifers has been less that satisfactory and I really don't want to loose this guy. My major question is...

All the branches that come off of branches either go up or down (vs left/right) As I see it, I have a couple options. One, try twisting the branches so that up/down becomes left/right. The second involves cutting all the down shooting branches off and leaving the up's. There are probably other answers, but I want to hear from those with more experience.


Identification help:

As near as I can tell, it is a Red Cedar...or Juniperus virginiana. But, that is a tree and I think this is more of a shrub. I saw one on the way to my son's school that is fairly mature and stands about 4.5ft tall. When I look up pictures of the needles, I get two very different types of picture...one that is identical (blueish green, ~3/8" needles) to my tree, and another that is different (deep green, scales for needles)

UTexas Pictures

I am not ignorant to the fact that the needles are features of the juvenile Red Cedar, and the plant I have is quite juvenile...But the one down the street I think is around 7-8 yrs old, judging by the trunk thickness an how fast mine have grown (I have two others in the yard, both about 3 yrs old)

I am fairly certain that what I have is a virginiana, but I lack the definite confidence in that, which is why I decided to ask the vast collective knowledge of the forum.

(Pictures to follow in the next post, I started this post then realized I need to resize them)

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Apathetik

Additional confusion come from the shared qualities of J. ashei and J. scopulorum with J. virginiana.

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Apathetik

One picture from each side, unfortunately, only one came out focused.

Attached Images

	Juniper 1.jpg (93.2 KB, 15 views)
	Juniper 2.jpg (94.5 KB, 6 views)
	Juniper 3.jpg (97.0 KB, 11 views)
	Juniper 4.jpg (95.3 KB, 8 views)

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Ravenna

Hi,

I don't pretend to be an expert with conifers (or otherwise) but the plant you have there seems very young. I think that right now the only thing you should develop is the trunk. The way it is growing now it looks like it will be a formal upright. If that is what you want fine if not you should change that. The green seems to have needles everywhere: I wouldn't wire over that but let it grow for the time being.

If you have the possibility to plant it in the garden I would do that rather than keep it in a pot. It will get thicker much quicker there than in a pot. Curious to see what others think.

centaura

My first question is what is the rough desired end height, or end trunk girth? Are you looking to create a shohin tree the same height as the tree is now? Or do you want something larger?

-Centaura

Apathetik

Yes, that is about the height and girth I want (perhaps a bit more trunk girth...but that will come)

Although it is straight as an arrow now, I want to go informal upright with a bit of a pronounced "zig-zag twist"

The wire is to help straigten the 90 degree turn it had right at the soil level.

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centaura

Hmmm... was that 90degree turn all that negative to the direction that you wanted the tree to go in? In other words, I would have used the wire, but not gone stick-straight with the correction.

I think your next move is to sketch out the trunk line that you want, and from there it will be easier to start working on branches. Its usually a good place to start by removing branches that fall to the inside of curves, and using the ones that fall to the outside of the curves as your primary branches. Now, that is just a very, very basic statement, but for me it helps me get a starting point when I'm not sure where I'm going with a tree.

-Centaura