Picea Mariana No 1

Black spruce

I collected 3 small spruce in October 2016, and only one survived mostly because of its root ball.

The most beautiful one died early spring.

I went back this September to collect another black spruce that would be used as the main tree in a forest or composition.

This spruce has an interesting bark and wound on the front. Unfortunately, the branches were too long and there was no taper nor too, so I had to approach graft the branches to shorten them, as well as using a top branch to bend it and graft it to create the future apex. I can’t deny this looks a lot like an electric pylon. But then again, it’s about improving my technique.

A close up at the graft, same technique I used on a red pine.

This tree will grow for the next few years in a container before being used in a composition with other spruces, but I really don’t know how long it will take; spruces grow so slowly I can’t really plan. I’ll just focus on making this tree survive and grow again.

In October, in order to create a better apex, I grafted a vigorous young spruce on the main trunk.

It is still very ugly, but this time, I do have a young tree pulling sap with its own root system, so maybe this will work.

Tree did not make it.