Hello friends...
Well... I havn't shown any new trees in a little while, but I wanted to share this beauty with you all. Ang3lFir3 and I bought it yesterday from Bonsai Northwest. It's his first major bonsai, and my first big maple. The caliper on the trunk is a little better than 3 inches. The pot it is in is about 16 inches. The nebari (which is one of the biggest reasons we bought it) is simply fabulous.
There are a couple areas where a large branch died back, and while it will confound quite a few people, we have no intentions of completely removing those branches at this point. They have good movement, and will be turned into some very refined jins. Nicest thing about jins is that you can always remove/reduce them later....
We are toying with the idea of putting a serious hollow in the trunk. But havn't made any firm decisions on that. We have time to sort that out once we get down the road of dealing with the jins, and developing a ramified crown.
One really nice aspect of the tree, aside from it's proportion and structure, is that there are no chop marks on the tree. There are no marks on the tree bigger than 1/2 in. and those that are there, are well healed.
The tree was an investment, but one which will more than justify it's costs in very short order. Most of the work on the tree will be done by Ang3l, and is reflective of my conviction that a newer bonsai student should work on a tree which will feed the fire of his love for the art.
We'd love to see virts of people's ideas for the tree...
So far... our favorite front, because it has the best view of the nebari, is the first photo you see.
Kindest regards to all,
Victrinia
