my second ever self styled bonsai

maple_kid

hi guys this is a nursery stock i got relatively cheap. I got it yesterday and decided to do a semi cascade. Love to hear some opinions on it because i think there's something majorly lacking from the design.

maple_kid

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maple_kid

first pic is side on, second is aerial and third is possible viewing angle. Anyway u may notice in 1st picture a very very straight branch. i do intend to fix that once i get it into a new pot

maple_kid

ficusfanatic

hi. good stock. i do like the third pic as the front, but maybe a quarter turn to the left? i'd bend the branches, where wired, it looks a a bit straight and stretched out. give some more curves and life, and flatten out the foliage pads. i say style a bit more and repot later. i'm always too hasty and regret not waiting on the repot.

all opinions...

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-chris-

maple_kid

wow thanks chris for the comments. ill try the new angle with the turn to the left tomorrow when i go out for tutoring. I do have to agree that the branches are too straight. that might have been what keeps making me think it looks weird. ill give it a shot

Maple_kid

*oh for a rough idea of what this tree used to be as stock, thnk about 3x as much foliage... yeh and the apex isn't great because i had to bend a branch from going to the left all the way back over itself so it comes over the trunk and sits on the right now. What im really hoping for is that the apex gets more dense so i can make multiple clouds to form the apex instead of just one

eeiko321

is that a juniper prostrata or a procumbens?

maple_kid

from my knowledge eeiko321 i believe it is a juniper prostrata. There are literally hundreds of them at the place where i got that stock. Problem with it though is that they are either big and really expensive, big but untrained for 60 dollars and very very small ones for 5 dollars. Around the stock i got there isn't much of a selection . If there were more i'd be having an army of shonins in training at the moment . But then again, 16 dollars is no bargain....

Vonsgardens

Don't know what to say. Why do fancy this to be a semi-cascade?

John

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"Wiring is simple; However, it is not easy to do it right" Boon

maple_kid

I dunno John, when i found the stock i just kinda sat there and said "hmm.. might make a nice semi cascade in a few years" mainly because it was already looking like it could become a semi cascade tree. But im open for ANY suggestions (including huge revamped virtuals. You could chop off the entire tree if you want to). Only time will tell if that semi cascade was a good idea

Vonsgardens

Hi,
Just wondered. Frequently folks who are new to the transformation process see cascade or semi cascade trees in their material. If you look at Al Keplers thread called "New shoes.." you will see a tree that actually works as a semicascade.

The key difference between that tree and this one is that that tree was not a "broom style" juniper that was wired and styled into a form that it could not support. Based on the pictures posted, it looks as though there is actually a potential shohin tree down at the base of the excessively long branches that were used to force this tree in to a cascade. A key point is to make the most compact tree that you can, and then work from there.

We don't have to wait for time to tell us that this tree won't work as a cascade- it tells us now. The nice thing is, you have a community of bonsai friends who will make suggestions, that might help you to not make all of the mistakes that we have made. I made a number of these cascade trees back 15 years ago or so- they are no longer with me (I raffled a few...).

Cheers,
John

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"Wiring is simple; However, it is not easy to do it right" Boon