The tale of the pot and the soil

bonsaial1

In many postings lately I have mentioned that I spend this down time in the fall and winter collecting all the materials I will need for the projects to come in spring. At this time I have begun to realize that I have no pot for the huge Cal. juniper I plan on styling this spring. The local bonsai mongor let me know that he was out of soil. You see.. I manufacture and prebag bonsai soil for his nursery. I make a little on the side and it keeps me in magazines and cutpaste.

I started out by making up about 50 bags of soil. I took them to the nursery and started to look for the pot that I would need to plant the juniper in this spring.

A little about the soil. The soil starts out as red lava, turface, sand and redwood humas. The humas is a little "hot" for bonsai soil, but it leaches out fast due to the fast drainage. The soil is bagged and I sit there and staple all the bags closed and put on the label. Its time consuming, but what else do I have to do. You can only argue on this forum for so long and you need a break.

Attached Images

	DSCF0293.JPG (65.2 KB, 103 views)
	DSCF0294.JPG (70.1 KB, 91 views)
	DSCF0295.JPG (61.4 KB, 124 views)

__________________
Real men don't wear coats with "happi" in the title.

Advertisement

bonsaial1

Looking at those bags of soil and the juniper in the background, gave me much to think about. I had started to think I may design this tree in a semi-cascade. After looking at all morning, I felt the safe bet was to style it into a slanting style. Anyway.. I had the soil bagged and ready for the nursery. I took the boxes full of soil to the nuresery and began looking for the correct pot that would fill my needs.

I found the pot I wanted. It was the correct size. The correct shape. the correct color. It is very dark brown, very masculine, and very formal. It has a band around the bottom and has flaring lip. It should be great for a very masculine, driftwood, slanting style tree.

The pot measures 24" x 17" x 7".It is a little larger than the box it is in now, which should be a pot large enough for this tree for many years. The pot has sides a full 3/4" thick and weighs in at 42 pounds empty. The tree planted it in will be heavy indeed. The pic of me with the pot will give you some idea to its size.

I can hardly wait for spring, with all the shohin I have to go into first time exhibition pots, the petrified wood planting, the land/water penjing, and the two huge junipers going into exhibition pots this year, I am salivating already.

Attached Images

	DSCF0292.JPG (51.3 KB, 106 views)
	DSCF0296.JPG (53.1 KB, 115 views)
	DSCF0298.JPG (58.2 KB, 155 views)
	DSCF0299.JPG (26.0 KB, 109 views)

__________________
Real men don't wear coats with "happi" in the title.

RedPine

Sounds like fun!!

I used Pine nuggets,red lava rock,Shultz soil condt., couple of handfulls of bagged topsoil,a blender,a noodle strainer,and a hammer, the oven,and a time released fert.The whole process took me about 2 days and I ended with 3 grades of soil. I loved every minute of it.This soil is going to my tropicals so I will be repeating this process (excludingthetopsoil) in the near future for spring.I will be using the cheap bagged peat for the next mix.I have about 50 decidious trees to repot this spring and I have some fall potting coming my way when my Nat.ArborDay shipment arrives.There will be about 10 of them ,I am going to shift over to 1-2 gal. pots.

When winter hits I will still be tending to my tropicals,.Next week I am building the walls for a cold frame I did the wood work on a few weeks earlier.Plexi glass will be used and I find heating it up with a hot lamp helps for cutting it.The thicker sheets you can score and break...but I can't afford those sizes.

This winter I am looking forward to ordering up some wire and new tools,and collecting thrown away growing pots. I will be hunting the hot deals on the used book market aswell.Hopefully spring will come before I know it!!

Emperor Fish

Al,

Great looking material by that fence.

I do the same as you do at this time of year - start my planning for next year. That gives me plenty of time to refine my ideas [read - change my mind constantly], before I need to start ordering things.

One thing puzzles me. You have bought a new pot for your juniper, before you have styled it, if I am reading your posts right. You seem to be saying that this is also an exhibition pot. How come? Don't you do your styling first, pot selection second? I can understand this way around if the tree was being refined and the main image already decided, or if this was just a grow pot, but with an initial styling?

Hope you don't get a nasty shock later Al.

Regards,

Fish.

__________________
Old age and treachery will overcome youth and skill.

HEALTH WARNING: Engage brain fully, before typing into keyboard.


"We are the average gamers and we'll kill you badly. There'll be no finesse. no fancy tricks, no inventive attacks, just 2 whole smg clips and a rain of 'nades."

Alasdair

I am curios as to how you are going to style this tree into slanting. Are you going to remove the foliage up the left hand side of the tree and work on the right?

It is a fantastic looking 'beast' of a tree, can't wait until you post some pictures next year!

bonsaial1

Posted by Fish:


This is a wonderful question and needs a very well thoughout answer.

First some background. I do have some pots that I have bought over the years, and have bought them because I feel that they were beautiful. I have them in my collection and display them as such. I will plant in them. I just havn't found the "correct tree for the pot".

So this is the first way. Pot first and then find a tree.

Second way. Have tree and find suitable pot for the tree. The traditional way.

Now about my predicament. I have had the tree for about three years. I have come full circle on its future design. I went from informal upright to semi-cascade, and now back to informal upright. It will be that in the slanting style. The pot! well... I needed a big pot. A very big pot. Big pots are far and few between in these parts here in the central valley. I know that the tree will be masculine in nature, and that a dark pot will accentuate the foliage more. I had checked at the local nursery some time back, and found that he did have some large pots that would serve my purpose. I plan on repotting this plant in the spring, since it does not obviously need a larger trunk, and the foliage is ramifying fine. A show pot will just save a year for the future of my time line.

Next, The guy that owns the pots needed soil that I make. I was able to trade out the price of the pot. I needed the pot, he had the right pot, he needed the soil, I had the soil. I was able to take the pot home for a little comparison to the size of the root ball and its overall shape with the plant. Something not everyone is able to do. I live less than a mile from the nursery.

So.. this tree and its pot may be a gamble, but I see it as a very small gamble in the big picture. If its not right, which I doubt, I will exchange the pot for one more suitable if I ever find it. I think you will find that the pot I have will be perfect for the design I plan on taking this tree.


I drove over 500 miles and 10 hours yesterday for a pot for a maple of mine. I did not find it. I have been searching for three years. When I find it I will pot it up correctly. In the mean time the one its in will do just fine.

Maybe not the correct way according to tradition, but I feel that I have enough experiance to justify buying a pot before I have the tree designed. If its not right, I will be the first to say so, that you can take to the bank

/|\
III Bonsai-al

__________________
Real men don't wear coats with "happi" in the title.

jhill

Al
Great piece of material you have there!!! Would it possible to get a closer shot of it?? As for the pot I think it will do just fine.
I have alot of pots that I have bought for certain trees and get them home to realize NOT!! But Like you said,, I will find the right tree for them.
That pic of you sitting there with all those bags reminds me of my younger days

I'll be watching for updates on this one Al
Nice Material
John

__________________
You can't see where you're going
if
You don't know where you've been

http://www.BonsaiBeginnings.org

RobyH

Hey! Al you had better start pumping a bit of iron to lift that beauty and pot!!
regrads RobyH

__________________
Its hard to sore like an Eagle when you work with Turkeys!

spoonman

wow i wish i had this sorta material available to me to make my own soil.

neways i dream of one day owning a beutiful tree like yours, too bad bonsai in australia has such a small community. but hey ive done my bit, ive got 4 people into it

__________________
"Little laurel trees, your roots can find
No mountain, yet your leaves extend
Beyond your own world into mine
Perennial wands, unfolding in my thought
The budding evergreen of time."
-Kathleen Raine, The Trees in Tubs