Wow.... serious chunks of that comment look SUSPICIOUSLY like my conversation with Ron on a Sunday afternoon in the middle of a nursery surrounded by WAYYYYY too many cool lil Mountain Hemlocks.

I wanted to find something new for spring... I went to my favorite local nursery and was just blown away when I found a group of 30+ Mountain Hemlocks. all of them were about 3 feet tall with near perfect taper. Most of them were pretty straightforward, you could see a lovely formal upright coming out of almost all of them.... then there was this one....

It had some slightly unfortunate handling at some point in it's life, where the pot must of been seriously tilted. The tree grew at a strong slant with all this awesome nebari anchoring it down to the pot to stablize it. But while the idea of it captivated me, it seemed a little out of my league.

So here I am.... stumped by the idea of playing it safe and getting something that would be easier for me to "see" the bonsai within... or get something unusual and be a little more bold than my normally conservative nature will allow. So I flip through the contacts of all the BT buddies I have called for one reason or another... and there was Ron. I knew it would be evening hours over there, but I was lucky and Ron picked up....

We went through the merits of the trees.... and in the end encouraged me to get the one he could tell I was most intrigued with.... the slant. He had me describe it to him in detail to where he felt pretty safe that I was getting a healthy lil tree.

Then I blurted out how I thought it would be MARVELOUS with the new Dale Cochoy pot I had just bought.... Ron put the brakes on that conversation. He started talking to me about the best interests of the tree... how he could already tell that I was going to love this tree... and that meant biding my time. He told me that potting it was the one thing I really did not want to do to it this year. That if I cared about the tree, I would care enough to wait. It wasn't going anywhere. He talked to me about stressors that effected the tree and how it would recover from various tasks. That if I chose to style and pot all in the same season, I would so stress the tree, it might take years to bounce back. So he said... Take it home... play with it... go ahead and do some styling on it. Enjoy your tree... but wait for anything else. Don't even think about potting it until next year.

Needless to say... that conversation was worth it's weight in gold. I can personally attest that Ron knows his arse from a hole in the ground...

As to the tree... it is a serious personal favorite of mine. It's still in it's nursery pot. It got a haircut and a bit of style... and it is well on it's way to becoming one of the true prizes in my humble collection.

Could I have blown it on my own, without having heard such excellent advice as I was given? Heck YAH! I'd call Ron again in a New York minute if I was similarly stumped in the future. Becuase I garontee... I would of been foolish enough to believe that I could pull off a major haircut and a potting in the same season.... silly girl that I am.

Thank you Ron.

So to end... Graydon... you are absolutely RIGHT. Everyone needs a mentor they can call on to help them navigate through choices and tasks. I am certinally thankful for those who lend themselves in that fashion for me.

Kind Regards,

Victrinia

This article is very valuable, I am new to bonsai, i have been involved with it for 1 year, I readily seek guidance from a family member who is highly experienced but I analyse something and then get feedback so my knowledge and experience is improving.

With my first selection i think it could have been a bit better, but keeping in mind what this article re-inforces, what i have learnt from experience and guidance from the family member who has been involved with bonsai for 20+ years I hope to continually improve.

Thanks for the pointers, from a beginner/novice its more than helpful.

P.S: I am going nursery crawling in a fortnight and will be sure to keep all of this in mind.

Ron,

Great article and great advice. I have bought the wrong bonsai material in the past, but with your words of wisdom, I will not make the same mistake.

Concorde

Nice job Ron. I had a similer article back in 2002 with pictures. Can't never have too many articles about bonsai basics.

Regards, Al

I'm brand new here and this was a great article.

Al... I read you 2002 article as well. Great information with the photos.

Been lurking for a while and now trying to get started.

Bill

I too am new to bonsai. I am fortunate to have limited access to a bonsai artist of more than 60 years, so I can find advice when I need it. Indeed I find that I get advice I didn't even know I needed.

I found both this article and the posts to be very helpful in keeping my potensai hunting in check. I only want a small collection at this point, though my desire for different species exceeds my desire for smallness of collection. (Imagine that!)

I have been trying to exhibit a great deal more patience than I am accustomed to in picking new stock because I am starting from scratch. I have recently ruled out trees and species that I am excited to try working on, because I know that the time investment for something halfway decent will be more than I as a newbie am ready for.

Thank you kindly Mr Martin, for helping me to keep my tree hunting within a reasonable perspective. I hope that my labors will bear fruit in years as opposed to decades, and your article will likely help me reach that goal.

In all my years in bonsai this has probably been the best thing that has ever been said about my efforts.
Actually there have been a lot of comments made here that do seem to make it all worthwhile.
Thanks a lot. It does mean a lot to me

Yes a nice article indeed...

I would love to see a follow up to this one along the lines of: If one has picked out good stock, how to go about developing it. I have seen others do it and would like to see a "Ron" perspective or slant to it.

Dangit Ron. I meant to get befores this weekend at your place. Though I'm sure I won't have a masterpiece, it'd have been interesting to track the progress in pictures.

I could take off all the wire I've got on it and take a few pics if you'd like.

WF