Ficus Salicifolia

dbz12fan

This what I did for the first styling of this one year cutting. There is still a little bit of cleaning up needed.

The widest part of the trunk is 5 1/2 inches in diameter (the widest part is a bit off to the side, so it appears smaller in the picture). The total height of the tree is 11 inches.

Suggestions, comments, virtuals?

Attached Images

pict0347.jpg (16.7 KB, 215 views)

__________________
"Success demands understanding"-Andy Rutledge

Charles Bevan
Vero Beach, Fl

Advertisement

Adam_MA

Man... I wish I had your growing season up north here. I think if I did something like that to one of my ficus trees, it would take me 3 years before it would even start to look like a tree again.
In your area, how long will it take you to get the canopy back?

Adam

dbz12fan

Adam,
It would only take a couple of months (depending on the time of the year, it could be longer) to grow the canopy back. The branching would not be in the correct places if I did that, though. It would just look like a potensai again.

If I keep up with the maintence on this tree, I should have it finished in about a year and a half.

The purpose for cutting it back so hard is to get proper taper in the branching.

Growing tropical bonsai in warmer climates is a completely different perspective than growing any other bonsai anywhere else. In colder climates, you must use the branches that are available. If not, you will be spending years to grow them back. Using tropicals down south, you always have the option of taking off every branch if you do not like where the current ones are coming from.

__________________
"Success demands understanding"-Andy Rutledge

Charles Bevan
Vero Beach, Fl

dbz12fan

In less than a year this tree has grown very well. Today, I defoliated it and worked on the secondary branching. Another year of growth, and this one will have a nice canopy.

Suggestions, pot suggestions, virtuals, critiques, criticisms, are welcome.

Attached Images

pict0056.jpg (14.1 KB, 82 views)

__________________
"Success demands understanding"-Andy Rutledge

Charles Bevan
Vero Beach, Fl

TreeBay

Hi Charles,
This looks like great material coming along. The only trouble spot I see is that the second branch on the left has a large shoulder in profile. I don't know what could be done to reduce that, but it would be improved without it.

Attached Images

shoulder.jpg (26.5 KB, 67 views)

__________________

Want to be a seller on bonsaiAUCTIONS? Get authorized today!

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

dbz12fan

This is the one major problem with the tree. Had I thought ahead, I would have selected a lower branch and carved the shoulder a bit more. I could carve a shari there to hide the taper problem. I know many people consider shari and ficus to be a bad combination, but I have seen it done sucessfully before.
One example- http://jimsmithbonsai.com/Plant%20I...FOLIA%20102.htm .
And another- http://jimsmithbonsai.com/Plant%20I...FOLIA%20108.htm .

__________________
"Success demands understanding"-Andy Rutledge

Charles Bevan
Vero Beach, Fl

jarrydbonsai

it'll look heeps better if you do what treebay has done in the virt. get some concave cutters and just cut that section out.

its a fig so it'll heal in 6 months if you let the tree grow free during spring doin this'll also help to thicken up those branches.

cheers jarryd

__________________
the collections always growing!!!!

dbz12fan

Jarry,
Ficus are very very tough, but I do not believe that this could be done successfully. In a 2d image it looks possible, but in 3d it would be quite difficult. Anyways, with how quickly ficus grow, the scar tissue on both side would soon fuse together making the same bulge that it has now.

__________________
"Success demands understanding"-Andy Rutledge

Charles Bevan
Vero Beach, Fl

Hank Miller

Charles

I are not very familiar with ficus salicifolia and therefore I would be interested in your comments about the following: Generally when I remove large branches from my figs
(ficus natalensis) I generally leave a stub - sometimes as long as an inch. I kill any new growth on this and wait for awhile until I am sure the stub is dead and has died back to the trunk. I then remove the stub with concave cutters and let the wound heal over. The reason for this is that I have found that after healing there is less chance of a bulge developing. I look forward to hearing from you. By the way it is an excellent piece of material and should develop into a very nice tree.
Hank