[QUOTE=Sal Ammoniac]
I wish I could say I was the Cecil Adams of bonsai, but alas – I’m a great admirer, but an incompetent practitioner. Forget about wiring, pruning and shaping – I have a hard time even keeping the things alive. With those tiny pots, the trees dry out in a flash in summer, and freeze to death in winter.
So I’m trying something new this year – large-format bonsai. I figure by using an eight-inch terracotta pot, and aiming for a somewhat larger tree – maybe two feet high – I can get a more robust plant that won’t dry out so readily in summer, and can overwinter out of doors. Maybe what I’m creating is too large to be called “bonsai.” Godzilla bonsai, perhaps? In recent years, because of my poor luck with pots, I’ve been training the trees while leaving them in the ground. This spring I’ve already dug up and transplanted one (an American elm), and maybe I’ll try a few more and see how it goes. The saving grace is that I’m just using weed trees from my yard and the neighborhood, so I can afford to experiment. I’ve got a fair number of yews, Japanese maples, crabapples, elms, and mountain ash.
Any other dabblers out there?
[/QUOTE]
Hey Sal, I certainly wouldn’t call that “godzilla” by any measure! Really large trees often require eight men to carry them about. I’ve found that really there aren’t any hard and fast rules to bonsai at all. In order to conquer florida’s recent heatwave and droughts, I basically had to re-invent the wheel. One of the best tools you can use is the plastic hanging basket. Take off the hangers, or alternatively find a plastic bowl about the same shallow shape. These are usually deep enough to allow you to grow and work on your trees while retaining enough soil moisture. I use 14’ diameter terracotta colored plastic bowls I buy from a garden store. A few holes poked in the base and you are good to go. My soil mix is a blend of organic potting soil, shultz’s aquatic plant potting soil, and orchid bark. Most trees are not ready for bonsai pots until LONG after you’ve transplanted them to these training pots. It will take a long time until the root systems will develop that is appropriate for such a pot. Luckily, using these type pots will give you a lot of time to work on your roots, as well as the shaping of the tree while keeping things neat and portable. Collected trees are best developed by trying to keep as much of the root base at first as you can. Don’t be afraid to lop off most of the trunk and branches either. It’s a lot easier to re-grow branches than it is to correct a bad trunk.
So a few pointers:
Yews: These guys REALLY, REALLY, hate having their roots fooled with. If you are going to transplant them, do it all in one go and place them in a location that gets regular water and filtered light until it recovers.
Maples: In your area they are probably hardy; go nuts and have fun. Remember to water frequently, heat is the enemy.
Crabapples, elms, and the rest: Fairly hardy and fast growing. Remember to prune off all branches except the ones you want to keep. All of these species will continue to bud back if you let them go for too long.
Wednesdays and Sundays are good for me.