Rocky Mt Juniper

Here is a RMJ that I got from Walter Pall about 2 years ago. I got it in a trade for a lodgepole pine that he later sold. This juniper is a very tough tree to style because it had a few very good options and that made it very hard to style.
But I have been looking at it on my bench for a few years now and always saw this in the tree. I also want to layer or graft the back branch off in the coming spring. I think that alone will make a killer little tree and I get to practice layering or grafting.

I first started by thinning and cleaning out about 50% of the foliage to get a clear picture of what I wanted to do, once I saw a cleaned out tree I decided that the vision in my head for the past few years was the direction I wanted to go.

Walter commented that he shoudl have never got rid of the tree....he was happy with the work done and now wants it back! haha!!!

Before Pictures. Click to enlarge.

The back branch that will be grafted or layered....it has good deadwood and will make a killer little tree.

Some midway through pictures

Finsished for now. Initial styling is done. I need to glue the deadwood in the front back on and I am looking to slightly edit is to make it shorter.... There is also some tweaking needed on the branches now that I see it in the pictures. This spring I will repot and post updated pictures when done.

Back

Fronts from slightly different angles.....