Pat Lynch candles the Japanese Black Pine at the entrance to the Adminstration Building

The new growth of pines starts as "candles" (small shoots that look like candles) that expand to become the new branchlets of the current year. If you want to control the grown of a pine, you can snap off all or some fraction of the candles before they expand. Pat has candled this tree before and will doubtless do it again. I think he likes being up in the air.