Thirsty Trident

bonsaibeginner

What gives, folks? My trident completely dries up after only a few days (2). I stick the stick down into the soil, leave it there, come back 20 minutes later, and nothing. This is how I was tought to measure moisture. In the meantime, my trident has exploded with leaves. Is there such a thing as a tree opening up too fast?

Soemone, please tell me that this could be normal.
BTW, I think I'm concerned b/c I have a sneaky suspicion that I killed a mallsai with water - just followed the directions, you know, but it wasn't such good advice. All of a sudden - thffpt! The leaves dried up, fell off, the whole thing shrivelled, and my wife printed up a tombstone for it on the computer.

It read "RIP - Here lies the body of Yoda, beloved bonsai"

Only a couple of things wrong with that - first, as I later inspected, I realized that it was nothing more than a planted stick with a very few small roots attached. Very few. Shouldn't there be a legal definition of bonsai to which sellers must be made to adhere? I can't sell a soapbox racer as an "automobile," so why can someone sell me a stick and call it a bonsai?


Best,
Paul

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TreeBay

If it is in leaf and healthy, located outdoors and planted in well draining soil, it would not be unusual for a trident maple to need to be watered after 2-3 days.

A lot of commercial mallsai are greenhouse grown in pretty much ideal conditions of high humidity and bright light, and then they are (typically) moved indoors and watered irregularly, either by the retailer or the owner. So they go from paradise to a desert in a matter of a few weeks. They also typically have an imbalance of foliage and rootmass that doesn't help.

Regards,

Matt

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bonsaibeginner

Good; that's a relief. My current plant isn't mallsai, but it was recently root-trimmed. That's probably what's accounting for its H2O needs. The mallsai I did have was killed. It is no more. May the gods of bonsai make it happier than I ever could.
Thanks,
Paul