Bonsai enthusiast Bill Chandler, believes that bonsai is 90 percent art and 10 percent horticulture.

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I didn't understand this particular statement : That didn't really rebuttal the myth, if you torture a forty year old (person) and compare him to a non-tortured forty year old person they will still match botanically. duh. I am not defending those that say bonsai is cruel. Tree huggers are stinky.
Also he probably didn't have to "paint" a living tree to look dead, he should have just used a dead tree. \

alright bye
mike

I would say 60 percent horticulture and 38 percent observation and 1 percent cursing and 1 percent patience

Well with a degree in horticulture, forgive my bias.

After doing bonsai for 27 years I'd say it sure helps to understand how a plant lives and survives from day to day. I personally think a knowledge of the external and internal dynamics of plant growth is important to successful bonsai growing. Once understood, you have a better chance keeping them alive for a long time, which is what we all try and do.

I only have a few trees that have been with me from the start.

The Art of Bonsai combines horticultual understanding with the Art of living sculpture. Here lies the rub.

I think if you study trees in Nature and see how they grow and the different shapes they take on as the years go by and understand why they look as they do you can let your imagination take over and see what results with your trees over a span of time.

It also helps in the early stages of learning to study the great bonsai trees that have lived and died over the past couple of centuries.

So, in the end, it's a mixture of horticulture and the Art of training plants.

An excellent book for beginners as well as long time growers is "The Art of training Plants" by
Ernesta Drinker Ballard. Along with all of the other excellent books by Murata, Yoshimura and Naka, along with the contemporary authors.

IMHO, in the end it's 25% Horticulture-25% Sculpture and 50% blood, sweat, and tears.

"Bonsai enthusiast Bill Chandler, believes that bonsai is 90 percent art and 10 percent horticulture"

I guess it depends on if you want living art or dead art. You better get the horticulture right or you will never get to the art.

I would put it more like a 50/50 mix of horticulture and art, each interdependent on one another to acheive long term goals.

"Tree huggers are stinky."

That's priceless!

Tony

I suppose it's appropriate that the majority of the new user questions we get concern horticulture. Things like:

• Keeping a dying tree alive
• Keeping a tree blooming and thriving
• Keeping moss green
• Killing bugs
• What kind of trees to grow where
• What kind of tree is it?
• Getting branches to grow where there aren't any
• When to transplant, what to use for soil

It's really nice that the advent of digital cameras has made it easy to discuss and share artistic questions on a forum like this as well!

Regards,

Matt

If you were seeking a carear in bonsai, what type of coarses would you take first? Those geared at growing, propagating, and keeping trees alive, or those geared at shapeing and style?