bonsaiTALK Community - View Single Post - Bare Basics fo what you need to start bonsai

Well, I first started (not too long ago) with a small juniper as a gift. My first investment was some cheap shears from Home Depot. $7.00 After I killed that poor little tree, (root rot in the winter) I bought another juniper from Lowes in the spring. It was a rather cheap tree in a gallon container. I think I paid less than $5.00 for it. With the shears I did some rough pruning to get a look at the trunk and branches. The trunk turned out to be nice, so I bought my first "real" bonsai pot for like $8.00. If I remember correctly, I bought some wire at the same time, but paid way too much for what I got. You can do lots with sime shear and wire I found. My last aquisition was some concave branch cutters and some leaf trimmers. The cutters have proven to be a GOOD investment! ($35.00)

Again, tree, shears, wire - I got it all for less than 25 bucks and did quite well with what I had.
Here are some bad photos of an old bonsai - that I also managed to kill after a year. This was my second tree, and all I used was shears and wire.
I will post the pics in more replies.

2-Jun-2002	#5
jaf1060 bonsaiTALK Neophyte Join Date: Sep-2001 Posts: 8	Re: Bare Basics fo what you need to start bonsai Well, I first started (not too long ago) with a small juniper as a gift. My first investment was some cheap shears from Home Depot. $7.00 After I killed that poor little tree, (root rot in the winter) I bought another juniper from Lowes in the spring. It was a rather cheap tree in a gallon container. I think I paid less than $5.00 for it. With the shears I did some rough pruning to get a look at the trunk and branches. The trunk turned out to be nice, so I bought my first "real" bonsai pot for like $8.00. If I remember correctly, I bought some wire at the same time, but paid way too much for what I got. You can do lots with sime shear and wire I found. My last aquisition was some concave branch cutters and some leaf trimmers. The cutters have proven to be a GOOD investment! ($35.00) Again, tree, shears, wire - I got it all for less than 25 bucks and did quite well with what I had. Here are some bad photos of an old bonsai - that I also managed to kill after a year. This was my second tree, and all I used was shears and wire. I will post the pics in more replies.