A Huge Juniper Transformed

Last Saturday I decided to attend a meeting at Midway Bonsai Society after hearing that a young member of Eastern Bonsai Society (EBS)  - the club I've been a member of for 12 years - would be doing a demonstration on a huge juniper.

Shaundre Craukamp may only be 19, but he already has a lot of bonsai experience, having joined his first club at the age of 10. After that club closed, he moved to EBS when he was 14. A year later he won the EBS and regional new talent competitions. Later that year he went on to win the national competition, becoming the youngest South African to do so.

The trees used for those competitions were nursery stock- Juniper Procumbens Nana, a little smaller than the one he's seen working on in an earlier post (he's the guy in black). Unlike the one in that post, however, competition trees have had no previous styling.

The tree he worked on this time was a collected tree - Juniper Chinensis - belonging to Jonathan Cain, a member of Midway.

Shaundre started by doing a little carving on some of the dead wood at the bottom. (There was far too much to be done in one session.)

He chose to do the carving by hand.

Then he moved on to the apex.

As everything up there was long and straight, and growing away from the trunk, a lot of bending was required - too much to be done at once without putting excessive strain on the tree, but enough to show the direction in which the tree will be developed.

First he split the area he wanted to bend, then he applied tape to prevent the branch breaking when he bent it.

After wiring the branch and adding some guy wires, he was able to pull it down in the direction he wants it to grow. I believe it will be brought closer to the trunk when it's had time to heal.

This was already a big improvement, but the branch coming up from the bend looked out of place, so he removed it, leaving a stub which will be used as a jin.

He then bent one of the lower branches up to create a new apex.

He marked a few areas that will need carving, including the marked branch, which is currently far too long and thick.

After all the small branches had been wired (with help from Jonathan and his wife Denise) and re-positioned the tree looked like this.

Shaundre will be paying Midway another visit next spring to do further work on this tree.

The Art of Growing Miniature Bonsai

At their most recent meeting one of my bonsai clubs (I now belong to two) had a fascinating speaker, Hennie Reyneke, who is well known for his mame trees.

Hennie holding a little Ficus Burtt-Davyi

I've seen his trees before and was delighted to get the opportunity to see how he creates his little masterpieces.

Of course, as is the case with bigger trees, creating good mame takes time, but seeing tiny cuttings transformed into the skeleton on which future bonsai will be built was really inspiring and made me feel a little bit guilty about some of the cuttings I've thrown away lately. I do however still have a lot of small rooted cuttings that I can play with and having already started trying to downsize some of my own trees, I feel certain that this is the right way for me to go.

Here is a close up of Hennie pruning one tiny tree:

Another being wired:

And the same tree after a little pruning:

As with all trees, it is important that everything is in proportion for miniatures, so you should choose species with leaves which are able to reduce well. Flowers and fruit must be naturally small as their size cannot be reduced. Big flowers and fruit on a tiny tree will look wrong!

Some of the species that Hennie recommended for miniatures are Maples, Celtis, Ficus, Cotoneaster, Pyracantha, Buxus and Lonicera, as well as conifers like Juniper Procumbens Nana.

A little literati

If you've got the patience to do so, growing from seed is a good way to grow mame bonsai because you can create taper and balance without the scarring caused by heavy cuts. Hennie also mentioned that fig varieties develop a thick buttress base if grown from seed. I have no immediate plans for trying that though as I've managed to grow ficuses with nice bases from cuttings, root cuttings and air layers. I'm really happy with the base of the Ficus Natalensis in the last photo in this post. That little tree was grown from a root cutting.

Miniature bonsai can of course also be created from small collected trees or nursery stock.

It is important to prune your little trees regularly to keep them in shape (something I'm often guilty of forgetting) and they should be repotted once a year, removing heavy roots to encourage the development of a fine root system.

One of the most difficult aspects of caring for miniatures is seeing that they are watered correctly. A good way to avoid them drying out is to stand the little pots in a shallow tray with damp river sand or gravel, providing humidity for your little trees. However over watering will lead to root rot, so drainage is just as important as it is with larger trees.

One of the styles I've never tried growing is root over rock. I've always felt that the rocks will make them too heavy for me too handle. However Hennie showed us a miniature root over rock Ficus, so I guess I no longer have an excuse not to try this style.

Unusual Displays from Last Year's Bonsai Show

With my bonsai club's show only days away, I realised that I still have a bunch of photos from last year's show that I was planning to write about.

Most of the trees weren't quirky, but the manner in which some of them were displayed was unusual.

Ficus with hippopotamus mother and child

Acacia forest with small hut and origami giraffe

Framed juniper procumbens nana rock planting

Junipers growing on a "mountain" - water feature

Juniper procumbens nana in a bathtub

There was also a Juniper in a rusty shovel which I wrote about at the time.

I can't wait to see what our members come up with this year.

Show Details

The show is over but our club meets at this venue on the second Saturday of every month. If you live in Joburg perhaps you'd like to pay us a visit and see if you'd like to join the club. It's a great way to learn.

Use Your Imagination

I hate to admit that when I first joined my bonsai club I became so bogged down by the rules that after a while all my trees started to look the same. I guess realising that mistake is the first step towards creating interesting bonsai, though I can't help feeling that mine still have a long way to go. Slowly I'm developing a taste for the quirky though, as can be seen in the development of my fig tree.

Some people have more imagination than others and fortunately it takes all kinds to make a club. Today was day one of our annual show and there was quite a mix of trees there.

Here's one by an artist with a lot of imagination:

Instead of a pot this Juniper is planted in the bowl of a rusty old garden spade which has been wrapped with barbed wire to depict struggle. There were a couple more elements to the display, but it was too much to fit into one small photo, so I concentrated on the tree and its message.

Obviously this kind of display isn't going to be to everyone's liking. You can love it or hate it, but you can't ignore it. I guess that's what makes it art.

One thing is for sure, my own show trees look very ordinary by comparison.

Trees in training for less than five years

It's showtime at my bonsai club this weekend.

In bonsai terms that should be one of the highlights of my year, but unforeseen circumstances have prevented me from dedicating much time to my trees over the past month and this week I found myself totally unprepared for the show. When I looked at my small collection of trees which are actually in bonsai pots, only one looked vaguely show-worthy but not really the way I'd have wanted it to look for putting on show.

Fortunately the club has introduced a section for trees which have been in training for less than five years, and those can be displayed in training pots. So I looked around to see which trees I could display in that section and cut my options down to four on which I did some preparation today.

These are my options:

1. Schotia Brachypetala

Schotia - before tidying up for show

This tree has been growing quite vigorously since its early spring pruning. Initially I planned to do no more than rewire it, but in the end I went a little further and ended up with my tree looking like this:

Schotia - ready for show

Though it appears that I did some drastic work, only one branch was pruned. The rest was merely reducing the volume of the large compound leaves so that the branch structure became a bit more visible. Though I'm not convinced the tree is looking its best right now, removing that foliage actually helped me to notice a few branches that had been wired in the wrong direction. That should benefit the tree in the long term.

2. Celtis Africana

Celtis Africana

This is one of my bigger trees and has quite a nice trunk, with a few secrets which I'll keep for a future post. Unfortunately I haven't put much time or effort into ramification yet, so the top isn't looking that good.

3. Olea europaea subsp africana (Olive)

Olive

This tree has had a bit more carving done since I last wrote about it in April. Since then it had put out lots of new growth all over the trunk, but I tidied that up for show purposes. I'm not totally happy with the style though and plan to let the branches grow out further for the rest of the summer.

4. Ficus Natalensis

Ficus Natalensis

The smallest of the four but one of my favourite trees. This one was propagated from a root cutting and has been grown with very little input from the members of my club, so this more than any of the others feels like 'my' tree. Although the scars may bother some people, I like them and feel they almost make the trunk look like a little person.

Unless I have a last minute change of heart I'll be taking all four trees along to the show set-up on Friday. Hopefully all will be regarded as good enough.

Other People's Ideas

I love going to bonsai workshops. They're a great place to look for new ideas while socialising with people with whom I have a shared interest.

When I joined my club eight years ago, things were slightly different. I needed all the help I could get in terms of style choice.

Since then experience has taught me that styling choices are subjective and that even the most accomplished bonsai artists may make suggestions that I don't agree with. Tastes differ, and life would be dull if that wasn't the case.

My problem has been developing the self-confidence to say no. Slowly I'm learning not to be rushed into any decisions I may regret later - most of the time. Sometimes I still succumb to pressure, but not as often as I used to.

In October 2015 I had the rare opportunity to go to a workshop attended by members of several of the clubs in my province. One of the trees which I took to that workshop was a small Syzygium which I'd air layered off a larger tree about a year ago. I knew it had too many branches but was undecided which ones to remove.

October 2015 - before workshop. The wires were there
 to secure the tree in its pot and were no longer needed.

Had I opted to remove only the lowest branches, it had the makings of a fairly decent broom style tree, but it was not to be.

One of the people at that workshop was a foreign guest. I'd already "met" her on Facebook and seen glimpses of the work she was doing, so when she decided that she wanted to work on my tree I gave her the go ahead.

As it turned out, her ideas were very different to mine and I came away with something that will in time probably become a fairly conventional informal upright tree. At the time the top was very bare, while the lowest branches were left as sacrifice branches to fatten the trunk.

October 2015 - after workshop

Since then it has filled in quite a lot.

January 2016 - before work

Today I decided to bring it inside for a quick tidy up, and not a moment too soon, because some of the wires were starting to bite quite badly.

Scars where wire has bitten into a branch

The branches held their position reasonably well when the wire was removed, so I decided not to rewire the tree for now. Instead I only removed a little unwanted growth from the trunk while it was still young enough not to leave unnecessary scars.

Unwanted new growth on trunk

I left one young twig though because I felt that the tree needed an extra branch in that area. It's got a lot of catching up to do, so I will have to let that one grow unrestricted for quite a while.

Zoomed in to show gap I'd like to fill

I also discovered one small branch which hasn't grown back since it was pruned and is almost certainly dead. Though I haven't removed it yet, I'll probably have to grow a replacement. Fortunately, as I've already shown, Syzygiums tend to produce masses of buds everywhere, so hopefully growing a replacement won't be a problem.

In time this should develop into a nice little tree, but I can't help feeling that it terms of style it will never really be mine.

After removing wire and unwanted growth on trunk - January 2016

My First Workshop

I still remember the first bonsai workshop I attended. It was February 2008 and I'd only been a member of my club for about three months, so I didn't know any of the other members well yet. Combine that with the fact that I was the only woman at that workshop and it will come as little surprise that I found the experience slightly overwhelming.
 

February 2008 - before the workshop

The tree I took to that workshop was the Ficus Wiandi above. It's a rather brittle variety of Ficus, so I was advised not to wire the branches but rather to style it using the clip and grow method, aided by the odd stick used for support.

I removed some of the unwanted branches at that workshop but told my instructor that I'd remove the others at home . My reason? I wanted to plant the cuttings. At that stage my tree looked like this:

February 2008 - after the workshop

Some of the men doubted my resolve to go through with what was suggested, believing that I was afraid to do heavy pruning on my tree, but they were wrong. I went home and removed those branches, putting them into jars of water while I waited for them to root. At that stage my tree was looking pretty bare:

February 2008 - after final pruning

 After that I let it grow unrestrained until December 2008 before taking it to another workshop. During that period it grew really well and the trunk thickened up considerably.

December 2008 - before pruning

After another workshop, it looked like this:

December 2008 - after pruning

The highlight of my relationship with that tree was when I displayed it at our 2009 club show, only 20 months after that first workshop. It didn't take much to satisfy me back then and our club has always encouraged beginners to show their trees, so this is what I put on display:

On show - October 2009

As I grew more experienced I started to see my tree's shortcomings and tried to improve its appearance, but in doing so I forgot my instructor's advice and tried  to wire one of the branches. Sure enough it broke off.

I still persevered with it for a while after that, but it refused to do what I wanted it to, so when show time came around again, I decided to put it on the sales table.

On the first morning of the show one of our senior members was looking at the sales table and got into a discussion on how to improve my tree. Apparently he decided to demonstrate what he would do and, unaware of its brittle nature, he snapped off another branch. Under the circumstances he felt obliged to buy the tree.

I still have one of its cuttings.

Uncooperative cutting - December 2015

It has developed a nice plump base, but like its parent before it, it refuses to give me a decent branch structure to work with. I keep cutting back the top, hoping to get some back-budding, but I fear I'm fighting a losing battle.

Joining a Bonsai Club

I first became interested in bonsai in around the year 2000, but at the time I was unaware that there were clubs which could help me to develop my bonsai skills.

So I did a little reading and then set off to buy my first tree. At the time I wanted to keep my bonsai indoors, which meant my options were limited.  It will come as little surprise that one of my first attempts was a Ficus.

Unfortunately I misinterpreted some of what I read and it didn’t take me long to kill my tree. I cried the day I realised that, after one too many defoliations, my little tree had run out of energy to fight me and that it would never put out any more foliage.

Happily I was not put off that easily and I soon went looking for my next victim.

After a few failures I finally learnt how to keep my trees alive but in the process I put little effort into styling them. With hindsight I realise that I was no longer trying to grow bonsai, just keeping potential bonsai as house-plants.

All that changed in 2007 when I visited a local bonsai show and was persuaded to join the club.

I was hesitant to attend my first meeting because I didn’t know how I was going to fit in among a group of strangers, many of whom had years of experience, but I needn’t have worried. Everyone was very friendly and helpful and joining the club changed my life.

At the time I knew an elderly couple who shared my love of bonsai but grew their trees entirely for their own enjoyment. I often discussed bonsai with them and one discussion sticks in my mind to this day.

When I mentioned how much I enjoyed attending the club’s workshops and how I appreciated the help I got from some of the more experienced members, the woman was unimpressed. She felt I should be styling my trees on my own. Of course I didn’t let her argument deter me.

It was only several years later that I finally got the opportunity to see that couple’s trees and I hate to say that I was really disappointed by what I saw. But as I said in my previous post, not every tree has to be a show-stopper. If they enjoyed their trees, that’s all that really matters.

That’s not to say they wouldn’t have benefited from joining a club. I’d recommend it to anyone who’s keen on letting their trees develop to their full potential.

Japanese Bonsai Tree Sunset Poster

by Lasting__Impressions