Pruning stimulates new growth

Sometimes it's not easy to decide when to prune a tree and when to leave it to grow undisturbed.

I've been accused of over-pruning my trees and it's often true. However in the case of the Schotia I wrote about recently, I feel vindicated by my tree's positive response to a haircut that some regarded as too harsh.

When I pruned the tree in August, it was looking rather ugly with the faded remnants of last summer's foliage.

Schotia after pruning - 23 August 2016

Today, barely a month later it has lost most of that ugly foliage and is covered with new growth.

Schotia - 24 September 2016

I have no doubt that some will say that it would have grown even more had I not pruned it, and had the tree been a different species that may well have been the case. But not with this one. Here's a smaller tree of the same species, which stands right beside the larger one and has been exposed to the same conditions over the last month. The only difference - the little one wasn't pruned in August.

Smaller Schotia - 24 September 2016

So far it has shown no signs of new growth this season.

Under the circumstances I felt obliged to give it a haircut to bring it out of hibernation.

Clip and Grow Ficus - the Second Chop

This Ficus Natalensis is one of those I first discussed in my post Clip and Grow Bonsai about six months ago. When I wrote that post I discussed how I intended to proceed this summer and things have gone more or less to plan so far. Only my intention to put it into a bigger pot has been put on hold until later in the season.

The reason for that delay is because I cut a fairly large surface root and have left it in the pot, hoping a new tree will develop from that root. If that happens I'd like to remove the new tree when I repot this one.

This is what it looked like before I started work:

August 2016 - before chop

Although someone at my club suggested I make the chop one branch higher, I decided to stick to what felt right to me. One quick chop and I was left with this:

August 2016 - after chop

As we moved from winter into spring the tree dropped all its old foliage, but not before new buds started developing everywhere.

Here are two shots from yesterday:

September 2016 - possible front

The above is my probable front, though I may change my mind when I see how the tree develops. It depends whether I decide to keep the left branch. I'm not sure it's in the best position, but for now it's the only one I've got.

September 2016 - possible back

From this side it's clearly visible that, in addition to lots of new buds on the leader and branch, the tree is producing new growth all over the trunk too. As my main focus is on thickening the new leader, I'll probably remove those unwanted buds. After that I'm unlikely to do anything more to the tree this summer other than repotting it when and if that root decides to grow.

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When I made the chop last month, I planted the top as a cutting but soon noticed that it was drooping and in due course it lost all its leaves. I'm happy to report that in the last few days I've noticed new leaves developing though, so I'm optimistic that it's developing roots too.

I hate to waste anything that can grow, but I'm slowly learning not to keep the smallest cuttings. Given the fact that Ficus Natalensis grows quickly, however, this one was too good to waste.

Is Rosemary good material for bonsai?

This is a Rosemary plant I started as a cutting about eight years ago, shortly before I killed its parent in The Great Vinegar Disaster.

Rosemary - September 2016

It has spent most of its life in its current pot, which has a diameter of 20cm (±8 inches). As a result the trunk still only measures 1.5 inches across the base. That's alright for me though because I like to keep most  of my trees small.

The trunk has quite nice character:

Close-up from previous photo

Unfortunately I'm finding it really hard to develop a good branch structure on this tree and some members of my club have dismissed it as a lost cause.

I'm not ready to give up yet. Perhaps a good trim will help with back-budding. Then again, in this case it may not.

Schotia Brachypetala one year later

I first discussed this Schotia and its development from a five foot nursery tree in a post I wrote late last year, shortly after it had been subjected to a very dramatic pruning.

September 2015

By the time I wrote that post in November 2015, it was already showing good signs of recovery and I left it to grow unchecked for the rest of the summer.

Despite being a relatively slow-growing tree, it put out strong growth and a couple of weeks ago, with spring approaching, I decided it was time to get rid of the excess growth and try to work on better ramification.

August 2016 - before pruning

After pruning the structure of the tree is a bit more apparent.

August 2016 - after pruning

I'm still not totally happy with the direction that the top branches are growing as the apex seems to be sticking too far forward. (This problem can be clearly seen in the side view photo I included in my previous post.)

I won't decide what to do about it right now though, but will wait to see what new growth this year's pruning stimulates. Maybe once those branches ramify a bit more, the top won't look so bad.

Apologies for the ugly end of winter foliage. Now that spring has arrived I'm hoping that some fresh green leaves will soon appear.

Collecting a Privet from the Garden

Once upon a time there was a skinny little privet which popped up uninvited in our garden, only inches from our boundary wall. Fearing that it would do damage as it grew, my mother instructed our garden service to remove it.

Although I was still pretty new to the art of bonsai back then and saw no bonsai potential in it, I hated the idea of killing it, so just in the nick of time I persuaded her to have them relocate it to a more suitable position in our garden.

In its new spot the little privet thrived and, despite the fact that I never allowed it to grow much above five feet tall, in time it developed into a sturdy triple trunk tree. After a few years I began to see its bonsai potential and (fearing another move would kill it) I began to wish I'd had them plant it in a pot instead.

Finally in November 2014 (early summer) I decided to risk the move and have them dig it up once more.

The dig - November 2014

Once it was safely out of the ground I was presented with an excessively tall tree with the remains of a heavy tap root.

Before potting

It took all my strength to reduce it to a more suitable height and remove enough of that root to allow me to squeeze it into the biggest pot I had.

After pruning and potting - November 2014

By the time the job was done I really feared for its survival.

Fortunately it was soon pushing out lots of new growth and by January 2015 it was covered in new branches and foliage.

January 2015

I was longing to take it to a workshop, but I knew I had to be patient so I left it to do its own thing for the rest of the summer and most of the winter. Finally in July 2015 I took it to a club meeting looking for advice on how to proceed.

I was a bit disappointed when everyone I spoke to recommended that I split it into three separate trees. However I had to be honest with myself and I realised that from a practical point of view the separation would be the best option for ME because I would never be able to cope with the weight of that group once it made it into a bonsai pot.

The next day I took the group to a workshop, where some strong men did the muscle work for me. Although their styling choices may not all be to my taste, They made a start which will make life easier for me in the future.

I came home with two nice trees, each with a trunk thicker than my wrist, and a thinner stump which was much less interesting.

Three trees - July 2015

Hopefully in time they will all become decent bonsai but developing them will definitely be a long term project.

Reinventing a Tree with Bad Nebari

Shortly after I joined my bonsai club I bought an olive tree from a local nursery. It was tall and straight with no low branches but I always planned to cut it really low down.

April 2008 - as purchased

I let it sit untouched through the first winter and in August 2008 I finally decided to move it to a pot and make the first chop. And that's when I encountered my first problem. The nursery had tied it to a large stick and try as I might I couldn't get that stick to budge.

August 2008 - the stick that caused all the trouble

Under the circumstances I was forced to take it to a workshop where a strong man was able to remove it. He also cut the roots back a lot harder than I'd dared to.

August 2008 - after root pruning

After cutting the trunk further he put it back in its nursery pot. I had no inkling then that the stick would come back to haunt me years later.

August 2008

The tree quickly recovered from its ordeal and put out plenty of new growth. Everything was looking good.

October 2008

It was only two years later when I put it into a bonsai pot for the first time that I saw the first signs that all was not as it should be. The root structure wasn't looking too good. Once more the potting was done at a workshop and my teacher used wire in an attempt to lower one problem root. He also tried to plant moss around the roots, hence the bandages in this photo:

October 2010

Sadly this didn't prove to be very effective as, once the wired was removed, the root refused to stay in place. As time passed it just got worse and worse.

November 2013 - Problem nebari

By late 2013 I was getting really frustrated. Attempts to plant the tree lower in the pot were unsuccessful and in a last ditch attempt to hide the problem, a member of my club planted moss around the roots.

November 2013 - with moss

Although I wasn't too happy with the structure of the tree I might have left it at that, but unfortunately the moss didn't stay there for very long. One morning I discovered that some visiting birds had ripped it to shreds and I was back to square one.

In late 2014 I took it to another workshop where I was persuaded to shorten the tree. The highest root was also removed.

December 2014

This might have improved the tree somewhat had I kept an eye on it over the next few months, but unfortunately I neglected it and while I got a lot of new growth, the tree suffered some serious die-back lower down. A year later it bore no resemblance to the (bad) bonsai it once was.

December 2015

It was time for drastic measures. My second trunk chop was even lower than the first. All that remained was the branch that's visible in this photo and another hidden at the back.

December 2015 - second chop

I was advised to wire the visible branch upwards but always felt that was the wrong move given the fact that the rather quirky nebari were on that side. I felt the tree needed to slant in the opposite direction and waited in hope for a new leader which, thankfully, soon arrived.

June 2016 - growing strongly

By June 2016 that leader was nice and strong and it was time to remove the left branch.

This is what it looked like in July 2016 after I'd removed that branch. I didn't touch the leader but I zoomed in for this shot to show the root that's caused all the trouble.

July 2016

What was once a really bad formal upright is now on track to becoming another quirky tree.

Torturing Trees

I've been a night owl my whole life and as a result I've never been a fan of morning workshops. However I need the input of more experienced growers, so I usually attend those workshops nonetheless.

Unfortunately when winter comes around I find it really difficult to drag myself out into the cold morning air and this year I've been particularly lazy, missing several consecutive workshops and generally not giving my trees the attention they deserve. Now however, with spring definitely in the air, I decided it was time to get back to work, so I headed off to today's workshop, taking along a couple of my more complicated repotting jobs just in case I lacked the physical strength to get the work done on my own.

While working on my own trees, I also got to observe what others were doing to theirs. That can be quite an education.

Among today's attendees was a man who was working on a ficus with two trunks growing close to each other. As he didn't feel they'd make an appealing twin trunk bonsai, he decided the best option was to fuse them into one thicker trunk. Tying them together without leaving gaps was no easy task as each was already quite thick. Part way through his work I was greeted by this frightening sight:

A few strategically places clamps had been used to hold the trunks tightly together until they could be securely tied in place. Once that was done, the clamps were removed and a bit of wiring was done.

I guess now it's up to the tree to do its part.

In between all the serious work done today there was also some light relief as the youngest member of our club decided to "attack" a little tree with a massive pruning tool he found lying in the garden.