With your permission, I'll add my large specimen to this gallery Dave and we can mark the differences(if any) between our climates with the Chief.

-Will

Will,

Go for it.

Dave

Dave, do you notice if the needles on your plant are more green or towards the aqua side?

I think I have an imposter in my garden and trying to guage the close up of the needles you show in pic 1.

Great photos, thanks for sharing.

Whaas,

Green all the way.

Post a close up of the foliage of yours and we will take a look.

Dave

My bad...

Great photos!

This post was edited by whaas on Fri, Sep 20, 13 at 11:06

Great pic. Have one of my own on the way, should be here tomorrow. Now if I can just keep it alive.

One of the best, but unfortunately it was the very first conifer I purchased when I started collecting back in 2011. Only if I knew what I know now about this plant, mine may have had a different outcome. Perhaps I'll give it a try again some day after my shade trees grow larger.

I've only four cultivars of pine that turn gold in the winter, but of the bunch it seems 'Chief Joseph' is the first to begin the color change. Mine is younger and not as nice as yours. If you check in on this post, I'd like to ask if you usually remove the dead needles? It's something I do with all my "premium" conifers to make them look their best.

whaas..you removed your photo.

Will...you didn't post yours.

Skeena..Of course I do clean up on my dead pine needles.

In time they will be removed. I usually remove them late fall so I only have to do one cleaning a year. This cultivar does not have a congestive interior and most fall through to the ground so it is not on my high priority list right now.

Dave

It takes repeated frosts to begin changing my 'Wates Golden' VA pine.

Thanks for the reply Dave. In the pictures I've seen of your garden, it does look meticulously cleaned. Tree photography is a fairly tough skill to learn, and one way I cheat is to clean out dead needles prior.

At my friend's nursery there was a 7 foot Pinus contorta 'Chief Joseph' which passed away last year. This a rare cultivar to find here in British Columbia, so I'm fortunate to have talked him into letting me have a liner plant.

Yours has perfect form, and reminds me of the photo displayed on the Iselii site.

Tim.

Sorry, I'm overlate to the party...

My chief, Middle of October. About halfway gold.

-Will

That looks fantastic. How old is that specimen? What kind of growth rate do you get?