I recently dug up a Jack Pine (Pinus banksiana) 4 weeks ago and it seems to have survived with the new candles starting to harden off now. Just this weekend I added a little organic fertilizer to help it along. In addition to some old opened pine cones, there are a number of large green cones that came with the transplant, and now on some of this year’s new candles I see some very small baby cones starting to develop. My question is whether – considering the main priority right now for the yamadori is to channel as much energy as possible to recovery of the root system and build up resources for overwintering – should I be removing these new cones or do the new cones draw enough energy to worry about?
Thanks,
Walter
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Winnipeg-Walter,
See discussion under “Japanese white pine question” in Horticulture section.
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Hmmm… okay. So remove the flowers and the cones then. Uhhggg, that’s going to be a days work! 
WW,
Personally, I’d remove only the female cone on the top of the candle/shoot. You could also carefully remove the large cones already on the tree as they will still take some of the tree’s energy. As for the male pollen cones, I’d leave them as they could damage the candle during the removal process. That’s my opinion based on Ryan’s comments and a professional in Quebec.
Excellent. Thanks… I’ll get to work on them.
Very cool for you! I have a monster field grown Jack pine I will get to eventually, but I would love a yamadori. After Pitch Pines, the Jack Pine is my favorite domestic pine species. Any pics or are you waiting? Here’s my field grown Jack.
There’s not much to look at yet, it’s pretty large and lanky right now… but it’s alive! Removing the pine cones was not as bad as I feared… it took only about 10 minutes yesterday, even when getting the new really small ones on the candles. I’m leaving the pollen flowers as recommended here. Another problem came up today though. We had a storm come through with heavy rains, and I don’t know if it’s connected, but today there I notice a white powdery substance on some of the finer branches and candles. Seems to have appeared overnight! I looked it up and I think it might be pine scale? Sprayed thoroughly with insecticidal soap, and will check again tomorrow.
Anyway here is a photo of the trunk with some nice bark…! The white stuff on the bark here is harmless lichen. IMG_3858|374x500
Could also be woolly aphids. The insecticidal soap should get them.
You are right. A nice tree. Good bark and movement at the base. I see at least one branch at the fork of the two overly straight branches from which you could build a nice tree.
There is a short jack pine article by Artsai on the Bonsai and Penjing Canada website.