Spent the day wiring some trees, including a big akamatsu.
Once more I came to the same conclusions:
1-) If the wire is too thin for the branch, it will not bend it properly, and we have to double wire, a waste of time, effort and time.
2-) If the wire is too thick for the branch, it will hurt the branch, and it will be impossible to bend the thin terminals, specially the short branches.
So...

So you do not use the same gauge wire on the whole branch, but step down as the branch gets thinner. You align the thinner wire for 2 loops with the thicker wire to get a nice transition.