Year 2 of JM growing. Last year, I went overboard from 30G to 3G...Acquiring everything and anything. My slow grower 30G Mikawa only sent 2 new shoots this year (or at least observable from the initial leaf flush). One 9 inch long and another 6 inch long stem. Granted this is cultivar dependent, but a lot of the other mature plants did not send any new crazy long shoots at all...I suppose it's still figure out its roots. Some of them I have need to place a few rocks earlier on in the season till the roots was enough to cause a lean whoever it rained. However, this is interesting and not sure what this phenemon is. On the 1G planted this year....some of them sent 3-4 late summer flushes that grew to about 3 feet long on average. I have read younger plants tend to do this ? I have yet to see the same on my more maturer plants
Hi MD, did you repot the 1 gallon maples? Since the idea in the nursery is to get the plant big and bushy as quick as possible, there may be a ton of slow release fertilizer in there. That's OK for life in a greenhouse, but not great in the real world. Otherwise, while young seedlings may put on some height quickly, I don't find that small grafts grow better than established plants. The contrary actually. Your mature plants are probably past the stage that the nursery is trying to boost them, or maybe haven't been repotted as recently. Standard nursery practice is to cut the long whips about 1/2 way, so you get riper wood, and you can pick the direction of next year's growth, so that it will get full but (if done right) not crowded. Since the buyer can't see the roots, many nurseries don't worry about them, and just beef up the foliage. Since it's going to get cold in NY, a lot of the really soft shoots are going to die over winter anyway. HTH, -E
Hi. The 1G that was literally just a small stick received in spring with maybe a few branches being 6 inches long or so being discussed....on some of them, it sent out 3-5 3' long healthy stems. Kinda surprised cause I think this same cultivar, that I saw in the nursery this year in a 5G, would be similar to the size and thickness of the new growth stems that I'm seeing from this end of season 1st year growth. (I get end of season, nursery will upot for the -market- for next spring season). Which has opened my POV....I do like the smaller plants. Seems to maybe take establishment faster, no major need to root wash, root prune, root cleanup - as some pots may start with a semi-circle early in it's 1g-Uppot-UpPot , etc to it's selling size of whatever I have bought... I get to control its framework *single leader* : establish its framework. For example, I was semi disappointed in the 7G plant I got. Granted; it has good branching but not sure if it was topped early in its life, or the *long shoots* , were left to grow unattended which kinda focused energy all over. Next year, now that the JM's have grown a full season of -roots-, I am planning to take a semi-nuclear approach. Granted, I think JM's with multiple leaders look great, I am planning to remove some of the thicker ones next dormant season, so it can refocus more on vert growth and putting all energy back into select leaders.
