Studying Doug Fir Growth Habits [Bonsai]

Frolic fools in meadows folly
Prickling pokers through the valley
Snap
Whap
Crack
Splat
Warm winds wail for me to wait a while
On this bed of nails, so soft, so sweet.

Practical Poker
An Original Nonsense Poem by @creativetruth

#poem #poetry

People who follow me know that I am an amateur bonsai enthusiast. In this post I will offer a closer look at this one particular tree in my cover photo.

ID: 0010
Nickname: Christina
Type: Douglas Fir
Age: 4.5 years
Grown: yamadori (collected from my own yard)
Last repotting: late spring 2017
Wired: never

On the first of May, what better way to start the growing season than to start sharing highlights of the new growth on my bonsai trees. This month, the Douglas Fir is the king of trees, showing new vibrant green growth and unparalleled health and vigor.

This tree is still very young in terms of the thickness of the trunk and branches. Over the last few years, I had been repotting my trees a bit too frequently in some cases, and especially with my conifers, as they do not need to be transplanted very often as long as the soil is continuing to offer good drainage and the tree is showing good signs of health. Removing and adding bonsai soil also becomes expensive for me, because the materials are hard to acquire. This tree is certainly doing well, and so my overall goal this year is to keep the tree small enough to stay somewhat proportional to the size of this pot it is growing in.

The main thing to understand about this Douglas Fir tree is that to develop new branches into its design, I have to work with the buds that it gives me. This is the perfect week to analyze how it grows to make decisions for its future. It responds strongly to sunlight it has received all winter, and tends to form buds close to the outer tips of the branches. These growth tips will continue to form into longer branches, lengthening out laterally. On the top-most branches, it forms buds on the top tips, and continues to grow the trunk upward in a straight line to the sky. This tree wants to grow into a cone-shape like a Christmas tree. I do want to keep this tree in a cone-shape, as it makes a splendid tree to decorate in December.

Since I do not want this tree to become the height of a full-grown Christmas tree, I have decided to remove some of the newly opened buds. You can see the ones I pinched off. The top left and right branches. Also the middle branches on the left and right side had their growth tips removed. Most of the low branches I have allowed them to maintain their growth ends, although it is the internal buds I really am interested in promoting. I want my branches to branch out more like a web or feather than single straight pole.

Pictured Left:
Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree! by @creativetruth

This strategy, I believe will form a fatter-wider tree shape, and it will also promote the lowest branches to thicken up. In the photo below, notice how the largest, low branches have the most multiple buds along them? I believe this happens because the tree has an open center, which allows more sunlight along those branches. This causes a reaction in the tree to signal for it to form buds in these mature areas, to gather more light by adding branches there. As these buds grow, this center area will become more crowded and bushy, which I think will help this tree start to have a bit more of a mature body shape/silhouette.

The younger upper branches and middle branches did not have as much back-budding along the center of their branches. Often the top branches send most of the growth hormones to the tips, because it knows that the top end of tree needs to grow straight up, so the lower branches have more room to spread out. The lower branches can only spread out sideways, which requires a lot of strength to maintain, so the top branches are designed to send buds up as much as possible.

My theory, I hope I am right, is that by removing the growth ends on the tips of some of the top branches, next spring the tree will try harder to fill in the vacant areas here, and therefore it will back-bud more on the middle branches, where more ramification of branches is desired to fill in the open space. I am sort of putting this tree on a diet from growing upward by pinching those open buds off. If I expose the top branches to lots of sunlight in all directions, and provide proper nutrition amounts, then it should spark the tree to direct more growth energy into producing buds along the vacant spaces in the top branches, and not just on the ends.

If I do not find any back-buds for next Spring along these upper branches, then I will have to allow the top branches to grow to full length, and hope that the long branches form back-buds in the year after that. Though I would much prefer to keep smaller sized branches as they are now, I may have to let the tree do what it is designed to do for a while: grow up.

Ultimately, I am merely the humble care-taker. The tree is the Creator and the Artist. I can train and style the tree within reason, and the tree decides how its growth will initially develop. I can force the tree to develop in certain ways, or I can let the tree creatively select its own path. In my way, I like to patiently allow for a little of each.

Thanks for checking out my post. In these in-depth posts, I will be sharing mostly my self-critique and self-reflection on my bonsai strategy. Perhaps I can inspire people to learn more about the tree I am growing, or give them ideas about how they might grow a bonsai tree of their own.

Also, you can check out my past review of this tree to see how this tree has progressed from seven months ago:

Evergreen retains its color for all seasons

Photos in this post are all #originalworks by @creativetruth.

Find me on discord and chat with other tree growers, bonsai enthusiasts, and gardeners. We have quite a few accredited experts filling out our ranks, and a helpful Spanish-speaking community.