European black pine, Pinus nigra Austriaca, collected in Austria in May of 2011. After collecting it did not open the buds, unfortunately. It stayed green, somewhat brownis-greyish green, but still looking alive. It did not develop any bods for next year. So the big question is whether it will die, or is dead already or it just paused for one year and will bring new growth next spring. When would it have new buds? Or are these black buds the ones that will open eventually? They are all like this. The last one looks the most alive. I cut one bud off an opened it. It was green and very moist inside, apparently much alive. Anyway I have not collecded it but I wanted it. I got it in a trade taking all the risk on my side. It was not expensive! My guess is that it has paused for one year. This has happened to me before with a ponderosa pine which paused for two years and became quite alive after this. The very first thing I did after taking the photographs was to feed the whole tree with a strong solution of all kinds of liquid feeds from Italopollo. I made sure all the foliage was fed very well. I believe that foliar feeding can work wonders in a situation like this. Also 'secrete' stuff like Vitamin B12 containied in Superthrive, Waldleben and Itlopollo stuff works here while it makes no difference on healthy trees.
Anyway, singing the International Socialistic Hymn in Russian was worth a try instead of regular prayers. We will see whether this was a good trade or not. It is a real challenge for me as gardener to bring this tree back to live. When it lives it will be most outstanding material, looking very much like a very good Ponderosa pine. European black pines are normally quite boring trees - but this is definitely not. I will report, of course - also of failure.
