Originally Posted by october

Hello Jeremy..Yes, you have to make it a mission to go to a ton of garden centers to maybe find one potentially good future bonsai. There are about 8 garden centers, including the chain ones, within 30 minutes from my house. Some days, I'll go to like 3-4 in a day and find nothing. However, after going to all 8 of these stores practically once a week for nearly the last month. I did find one tree...HOORAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I found it at a farm stand that sells trees during the season. It is one of the ones that we talked about. Independently own and has some good stock. The sales lady came up to me and before she got too far into her sales pitch, I stopped her and told her why I was there. She said oh, if your looking for something for bonsai, you should go around the back of the green houses. She said, thats where we keep our, not in so good shape, stock. Either unhealthy or neglected stock is back there. I went back there and saw maybe a couple hundred trees in so so condition. I was just about to give up and leave, when I found a silver arborvitae vareigated that had some interest. I bought it and paid $16.99....I had already formulated a styling plan at the nursery and have already completed the styling, well for now. It came out pretty well, I think. However, it will need a couple/few of years, at least, for refinement and root training.

Rob