I found what could be an interesting subject, but am not quite sure how to deal with it now.
I have quite a few Virginia Pines on my property - & they're all wonderful gnarled, twisty-turny type trees. Very interesting-looking, even as just regular tree specimens, & their needles when crushed give off a fabulously strong scent of crushed orange peel.
Anyway, this morning I came across a 16" high seedling near my barn. It's ramrod straight with perpendicular branches, but definitely flexible enough for some really interesting work in the future I would think. Trunk right now is probably not more than 2" around.
It's sort of in the way where it is, & is definitely in an area that I wanted to weedwhack soon.
Any thoughts/ideas?
Virginia Pine
did some research and got this link
http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/bonsai/msg0512311113758.html
Check it our...it may help...
Thanks. I do have some books & have done some research, I just can't seem to find a definitive answer as to whether I should leave it in the ground or perhaps transplant it into a large container (3-5 gallon). I'd hate to see it accidentally whacked or run down during the winter.
If you fear for the safety of the tree and you wish to begin training for bonsai, you'll want to lift it. Young trees will withstand all kinds of indignities and bounce right back because nearly the entire tree is dynamic (living) mass. You can lift it and pot in an appropriate bonsai soil in spring. If you wish to give yourself some insurance and shorten the trees recovery time, you can prepare for a spring lifting by root-pruning now. I can't tell you how far from the trunk to do the pruning w/o seeing the tree, but you'll be making (now) several cuts through the soil at an equal distance from the trunk. The object is to sever about half the roots at some distance from the trunk, the result of which will be the growth of new and finer roots, closer to the trunk that you can include in the rootball when you lift the tree. This lessens the shock to the tree and as noted, speeds recovery. If you don't wish your efforts to end in frustration, it's important that you have a suitable soil, prepared in advance, to pot the tree in.
A second school of thought would be to lift the tree and transplant in a safer spot and allow the tree (trunk diameter) to grow to whatever size you choose. The tree can be shortened (chopped) later and a side branch trained up as the new leader. If you wish a good candidate for bonsai, it's important to periodically thin upper branches to allow adequate light to lower branches so that you can preserve them for later incorporation into your design. The prep for a transplant would follow what I outlined for the potting up of the tree.
Al
Thanks Al. If the weather is cooperative I'll try & take some pics of the little tree to post here which might give you a better idea of what I'm dealing with. It really is a nice little tree - just sprouting in a lousy spot. And since I already have quite a few full-size Virginia Pine on the property & don't really need more, & am highly interested in Bonsai, thought this specimen might be worth trying to save/work with, even if my first efforts aren't stellar - lol!!