sry to intrude on personal convo- and definetely pardon me if i seem out of line.
but in my experiences and from what ive learned through botanical classes and other growers- LST is different than how you are explaining it IMO
givin i might be misunderstanding, and i havent seen pics of your stalks-
tieing down, in its simplicity is what you are explaining i believe.
redirecting the main stalk in different directions and keeping it pliable (sp?) is not LST. atleast in the books.
I learned in the past that low stress training was actually thought up by an old lady (called LST much after she claimed she thought of it).
and of course she was trying to keep it stout, but learned that she could kind of 'decorate the plant' if you will by the look of the wooded out stem- which would later be taken farther into more techniques of vining a plant out.
which is used widely in indonesia for hemp- they have found they can grow cannabis much longer and closer together(more hemp fiber of course), while harvesting prime hemp off continuously wooding stalk.
LST, atleast from what i have learned, is stationary i guess you could say. there is no redirection. there is your initial bend past the previous node, causing branching and undergrowth to catch up of course- and then also hooking and bending the base of the stem, causing a gradual permenant lean. making the main stalk go paralell to the ground.
givin this could just be the side of the story i 'grew up' up on- but this is my understanding.
i did 2 tutorials on overgrow concerning tieing down and LSTing outdoors- and this was the background i based that on.
your bush and short stature would be the stalks all coming from one side of the main stem- which is now parallel to the ground
where as tieing down; the bush would be the product of the continuous redirection of the main stem, allowing the 'secondary'-i guess- stalks to grow.
and when you looked at the undercairage, the stems would be coming from all around the stalk- rather than from just one side with lst.
i have always thought, and said that tieing down will give a bush that looks close to the same as it would if you topped the plant, minus the extra lateral growth. where as LST would look more like a vine on the undercairage.
is this how yours is ending up? like i said i could def. be misunderstanding what your saying. but i have always thought this was the technique and outcome of low stress training