BonsaiCAM For May 1, 2004

TreeBay

Today we had a several trees on the bonsaiCAM, looking at some mid spring work. I also did a little work on a Japanese Black pine in order to demonstrate what would be done in Mid summer.

The first tree was a Ginkgo clump that needed pruned back. The goal here was increase the ramification (twigginess) of the tree. In order to do that, I cut back the shoots that had developed this spring into just a cluster of leaves at the base of the stem. This will promote backbudding and also result in shorter internodes on the resulting regrowth.

Ginkgo is an exception for me in that I don't pinch it. I let it grow out all it wants and then cut it back. So far this has worked pretty well.

A - the tree before any work
B - cutting back some of the long branches. It's important to bring the shoots into scale by making sure that the trunks lengths are proportional to their widths.
C - more shoot pruning
D - holding one of the twigs removed from the lower trunk

Note the difference in foliage lengths in photos A & C

C is the final photo (sorry to get C & D out of order!)

Attached Images

2004may01_ginkgo1.jpg (65.3 KB, 468 views)

__________________

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

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

Advertisement

TreeBay

The second tree is another Ginkgo that was repotted in an earlier bonsaiCAM session.

A - This tree has a very strong trunk. The overall goal with this tree is to develop the flame style appearance and to do so we will need to prune at the top and encourage the growth and ramification of shoots along the sides

C - Pruning the top of the tree to increase vigor and ramification of lower branches

D. heading back just the tips of the strong side shoots to encourage more branching

B - A view with this period of work completed

Attached Images

2004may01_ginkgo2.jpg (64.4 KB, 307 views)

__________________

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

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

TreeBay

Next some thinning and pinching on a Shimpaku. This Juniperus chinensis procumbens (Japanese Garden Juniper) was grafted with three scions of shimpaku juniper. It needs about three more. At this time some thinning needs to be done to enable light to penetrate. Otherwise the foliage load will exceed its roots ability to sustain it, and the branching will become coarse from rapid growth.

This series just shows some overall views of the tree in its training pot (a bulb container) I couldn't prune the shimpaku foliage as much as I would have liked because I need some strong shoots from it for future grafting on other branches.

Attached Images

2004may01_juniper.jpg (61.8 KB, 307 views)

__________________

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

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

TreeBay

Satsuki Azalea "KINSAI"

Kathy asked me to touch this tree up so she can take it into work. I haven't done much work on it since pruning a few of the major branches that were poorly placed. That was two years ago.

Now it needs to have the silhouette restored. I won't worry too much about shaping individual branches because we'll just be enjoying the flowers for the next week or so.

I did get some nice long shoots for cuttings. These had grown 6" during that time.

A - before the work
B - lots of moss (too much!) on the soil surface. Don't let your trees get too overrun. We'll be taking off half of this and covering the balance of the soil with a fine fir bark (orchid bark) mulch
D - The question arose about flowers and why there are so many on this tree. Kinsai is prolific with small flowers, and this tree has a lot of ramification, which produces a lot of potential for flower buds. One thing to watch out for is that just before flowering, your satsuki might start to throw leaf buds, which if allowed to grow will overtake the flower buds they surround. If you see it start to happen, it will look like the shoot I am pointing at in "D" with two, three or more leaf buds surrounding a flower bud. You would want to cut the leaf buds all off at this point until after flowering
C - Photo with this stage of the work completed. After a few days display, when 80-90% of the flower buds have opened, the satsuki azalea should be debudded and cut back rather severely, leaving just a couple of leaves on each shoot. We'll cover that soon.

Attached Images

2004may01_azalea.jpg (66.5 KB, 286 views)

__________________

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

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

TreeBay

It's tough to cram an entire discussion on decandling into a bonsaiCAM session, but a request was made for some Black Pine work.

It's still mid spring here and a little early for the type of decandling I practice. Ordinarily we'd begin decandling in mid June (roughly, but with a lot of trees, you start early and finish late!)

Anyway, we treated this tree as if it were later in the season to get some discussion material, and it was rather healthy so there won't be much ill will on its part!

Pines are strongly top dominant. If they had their way they would become tall trees, shedding all their lower branches in the process. This is not what we want for bonsai, so we need to keep strength in the interior and lower branches by pruning and thinning, particularly in the stronger areas.

Begin by reviewing the tree and seeing the zones of strength and areas of weekness. The typically strong areas on the top and outer branches, especially the branch tips tend to throw nice fat candles that are long. Here's an example of one.

Attached Images

2004may01pine2.jpg (39.6 KB, 258 views)

__________________

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

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

TreeBay

That's in contrast with the shorter candles at the interior and lower branches of the tree. To bring this all into balance, the Japanese Black Pine is decandled.

Now there are a lot of ways of decandling. some people break immature candles in half, others remove the candles progressively over a period of 2-3 weeks, cutting the weakest first, middle strength over the next 10 days and the strongest last.

The method I describe here and on the TreeBay Bonsai Tools & Supplies site in the articles section has the advantage that you can work the entire tree at one sitting. The article on that site covers the theory in more depth, but briefly put, we are going to cut the candles off just after they have matured and opened out into needles in the summer, but we do it in a particular way.

The candles are cut leaving a stub whose length is proportional to the strength of the candle. So if you have a strong candle that's thick, say 1/4 inch, you'd leave a stub 1/4 inch long. If you have a weaker one that is only 1/8 inch thick, you'd leave a stub about 1/8" long.

That length is measured just above the crown of needles from last year's growth. There are more detailed pictures on the TreeBay site. We'll talk more about decandling as we get closer to summer.

The remaining photo sequence shows

A. Replacing some of the top soil lost to settling and erosion. I added about 1" of fresh soil and worked it into the top 1" of existing soil with the chopsticks (B)

C. Decandling with the shear. These candles on the end of the lower branches are about mid-strength and will be cut to about 5/32"

D. Also discussed was THINNING, which is the process of plucking needles, primarily from areas of strength. In this example I show the five needle pairs I would leave surrounding the stub in areas of greatest strength. I would leave more needles on middle-strength candles and nearly all on the weakest. We also discussed removing needles from the branch crotches.

E. A potential change in planting angle was reviewed after the work was completed.

Attached Images

2004may01_pine.jpg (66.8 KB, 273 views)

__________________

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

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

TreeBay

Here is a root-over-rock alberta spruce that I started about 10 years ago from gallon stock.

This tree was thinned in readiness for wiring. It had already been pinched back earlier in the spring.

The work consisted mainly of thinning congested areas where there were mutliple buds to just two twigs and cutting back where possible. When we rewire this one, some major differences will become apparent.

Hope you enjoyed this section of the bonsaiCAM

Regards,

Matt

Attached Images

2004may01_picea.jpg (55.2 KB, 270 views)

__________________

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

bonsaiTALK: Over 100,005.36 Megabytes Served this Month!

spoonman

good work.

__________________
"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