First, thank you Owen for your info.
Correction to Mr. Valavanis' technique. His technique (deciduous trees only) is to remove the first set of leaves (not buds) on the terminal buds as they are beginning to open. I would search this on the IBC or this forum on the word "Valvanis" and it should come up.
Secondly Harry Harrington's website, bonsai4me.com, also has a similar method. Look at the species guide for Acer Palmatum. He presents the info a bit differently but I think it is the same concept. Again these methods are for refined trees.
Bill V. states that this method takes a long time to perform and that he only does it on the trees he plans to show during a particular season (because it is so time consuming).
There seems to be some controversy with Walter's trimming method (as always in the bonsai world). However, I always take Walter's, Bill's, Owen's, Kirby's, Brent's and some other's advice as gospel. These guys "got the goods." One must distinguish between good and not so good advice in the forums.
Editorial (again) - I recently attended a meeting of the Baltimore Bonsai Club in which we were deciding which trees were good enough for the Potomac Bonsai Assoc. show at the Nat'l Arboretum. It said alot about many people's ideas of good trees. A number of folks brought little sticks to be considered for the show. We have a long way to go in the USA and we have to learn to be honest with ourselves.
Best to all,
Augustine
central MD 7a