A busy few months

 

the last couple of months have been hectic it seems. A few changes at the factory have taken up loads of time as new machines have been ordered and installed to do the jobs as staff moved on to other things. In amongst it all I had a tree accepted for the Noelanders show so it needed a bit of tidying up before being trusted to Peter Warren to take to the show, set up and bring it back. Its the first time I've done this and I must admit that having met Peter properly when he came down to cornwall to hold a few workshops at my place last year I had no reservations about handing the tree over.

Obviously Cornwall is the back of beyond so it required a bit more planning and this is where the bonsai community pulls together and before long we had a plan where I could drop my tree off in South Wales ready to be loaded up into the Noelanders van later in the week.

 

Cutting a long story short the blizzard that caught Devon and shut the roads left me on the one side and the show on the other...but the trees had arrived safely 24hrs before

here is the pre show photoshoot.

 

and a beautiful picture of my first noelanders entry, a special thanks to everyone involved in getting it sorted.

3 days later I was driving up to Willowbog for a few days I'd been looking forward to for over a year....2 days of workshops and a demo day with Ryan Neil. There was some weather on the way but nothing was keeping me away. Day one was a group talk about pines and work on the juniper I took up - a lovely yamadori japanese tree that had been grafted with itoigawa foliage that was still unstyled. There was such a flow of information and tips and the day was spent selecting the branches, removing and thinning out the foliage and wiring just about every other bit of the tree.

 

 

 

 Day two was a talk about juniper techniques then down to some tree styling - It was a perfect opportunity to get some help with my Hinoki as it was sat in the other room following the show so before long we had added a guy wire to the main branch and cranked it down quite a long way to improve the branch angle. Once you move the bottom branch all the others are out of place so the afternoon was spent working up the tree setting new branch angles and thinning out the dense arras of foliage. Now the tree has more light and air penetrating the crown and inner branches so the foliage with improve further. Dealing with the whorled foliage was easy too - i have mostly used fine wire to twist the upright foliage fans flat and just cut off the downward shoots - very time consuming but always looked ok. In the time i've spent with Ryan and Peter Warren one thing above all else comes across and that is to not complicate matters or to make hard work if there is an easier but still effective solution. My hinoki had plenty of floiage so all the upward whorls were cut off, all the downward ones were cut off too, and then all the little shoots that were in the crotches of the branches were removed.

 

At a guess 15-20%  of the foliage was removed but the tree looks better for it. The pruning of the upward whorls will continue whenever they are seen and before long the entire tree will have only flat fans of foliage with no wire. The tree now is getting a well deserved rest from the stress of being made show ready, taken to Belgiumand back then the aftershow maintainance work. The suggestion was to work on the foliage for 4 years and then show the tree again - which sounds like a plan to me.

 

This weekend was the Swindon show and i was lucky enough to have had a tree selected to display - a chinese elm I've had for 22 years.

 

 

The display was chinese Elm, Zelkova accompliment planting, Paul goff scroll and my xmas pressy stand - perfect height for this tree too.

 

 

The show was excelent - a real social day and the first main event on the UK calender. Great to catch up with so many friends and blog readers - nice to meet you all. Everyone is looking forward to the shohin show next month Nr Bristol too. That will start another few busy bonsai filled days and nights to see out March....the show is sunday at failand hall, Peter warren is then coming back with me to Cornwall to hold our second set of workshops on the Mon & Tue and finally he is giving a talk at out local club on the wednesday evening. There is one workshop place available for the tueday if anyone wants details just add a comment or message me.

 

One week later is the EBA event - the European Bonsai Association annual get together that is in France this year. On the Saturday is the European styling talent final and I'm practicing hard ready to represent Britain and Fobbs. We have a bit of a bonsai related project being set up at the moment and I managed to pick up 10 unstyled Itoigawa junipers with chunky and twisted trunks from

2.5cm thick to about 7cm thick so I've got some practice material. Just incase it isnt junipers I got about 15 pines - black, white and a red too to practice on....all have movement in the trunks and unstyled tops so their seems to be wire just about everywhere in the house and unit atm.

 

 

 

As they get finished they are sneaking onto the sales table at the club , ebay, or building up the stock benches ready for the new project. Here is a little juniper done while watching Corrie !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 coming soon Bonsai @ 16

 

A little bit of everything from a little starter pine to a specimen pomegranite

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Crenata Chronicals

Here is the first 12 months in the life of a Fagus Crenata Japanese white beech group planting.

Last january I bought the group from Willowbog while visiting the British Shohin show and it was the tallest bonsai that I had - seemed funny at the time to look at tiny ones all day but buy a 1 meter tall one. We wrapped the pot and branches tightly in palletwrap so it could be tipped on its side in the boot of the car without all the soil falling out and home to Cornwall the tree came. The tree was a very good price in order I think to tempt someone to move it further south, away from some of the harsh late frosts that can occur further north. There were a few dead trunks in the group and a couple that were not too good but the plus points were the excelent bark colour (bright white without lime sulphar) and the fact the main tree was very strong and heathy.

 

The timing of getting the tree coincided with an online progression contest run by Ryuga tools so i entered the tree as it was the only unstyled material i had at the time. This is an online picture based contest with initial pictures and ongoing progression pics being submitted for judging, but during the competition you could not publicise the material where people could comment. I've now submitted the final picture so can show the tree here.

This was the tree at the start

Working from the left 1st trunk is a dead one, then 3 live ones, a dead one, 2 live and a dead stub. Tree is in a 1 meter mica oval and biggest tree is a meter tall.

                                           Cleaning off all the leaves to see what was what



                     Next job was to cut out the dead trunks so the remaining bits could be assessed

 

 

 

The best view of the main tree was actually from the side - the trunk base flared and the roots added even more width and strength.  With this in mind I removed the group from the pot and seperated the trees where possible - some roots were fused together so some trees will always stay in position but others can be moved around. Here was the result from the first repot where the aim was to get the main tree in the best position

An experimental airlayer was taken from the top and some wires used to pull down the upward branches. Now it was just a case of waiting to see what leafed out......................


Mid summer and there are two weak trees at the back - both are living but only a few buds opened. Rather than spend years trying to get them up to the same vigour as the rest of the group they were removed. Also a lot of the very strong upper growth was reduced to begin adding shape and to drive strength down to the lower branches.

Early Autumn and this is what remained - the leaves are turning and the final plan is coming together

 

 

The tree was repotted into a nicer Walsall ceramics oval as no roots needed pruning and it was good to see very healthy mycorrhiza in the rootball - there had been visible mushrooms too. I wanted the two stray trunks closer to the main planting so roots were combed out so the gap could be reduced.

More of the upper branches were reduced and everything that needed it was wired. One brave move was to cut out the top of the secondary trunk - it was thicker and knobbly while getting muddled in the canopy of the prime trunk - once cut off the spaces between the branches seemed to work better. A few pictures for the Ryuga competition, a few tweaks, a few more pics and here we have a one year progression (hopefully a progression ! as there has been a lot of reduction)

 

I find information on Crenata quite thin on the ground so here are a few things I did, and please add any other information that may help others to the comments.

Pruning: I let the tree leaf out and the buds extend - strong buds made 6 or 7 leaves. While the tips were still soft I cut back strong shoots to 2 or 3 leaves. (this is a fairly standard native beech pruning method) In correspondance with Owen Reich he gave me a little more info......before cutting back the shoots study the leaf bases - some produce buds at the base while others do not. Once the tiny buds are visible cut back to 2 or 3 visible buds not to a number of leaves. This method is a lot safer and gives far more options as there will be back up buds on every shoot in case some refuse to open - as they do at times. This also gives choice of new branch direction when pruning as there will be different buds to pick from, and it avoids totally the scenario of cutting back a shoot to 2 leaves and neither having a bud at the base.

The tree only made one flush of growth (other than a few secondary inner leaves that opened near the trunks) so the outer thinning let light reach these weaker shoots and internal leaves, strengthening their buds for next year. This is the third crenata I've had and I find the work of this year is essential to make the buds strong for next year. If you consider the dormant cigar shaped bud formed now already has the fixed number of leaves in it for next years growth. A weak tree will have weak buds - these will have few leaves formed in them, so the chances are the tree has an even weaker year ahead. This is a key reason why so many white beeches are seen with just single pale leaves stuck on the end of bare leggy branches. You can easily assess how a tree has been doing in previous years by the appearance of the shoots - if a tree only has one or two leaves on the branch tips and has not been pruned back you know it was underfed and will not have strong buds for the next year.

Feeding and watering:
If they dry out on a hot windy day the leaf edges scorch. This is caused by a salt build up in the leaf margins rather than just the leaf actually drying so it can be reduced by using the best quality water you can - tap water in your area may be high in salts and strong chemical fertilizers can be another cause. All the time the tree is moist the leaves transpire normally and remain green, but as the pot moisture drops the flow to the leaves reduces so the leaf transpiration reduces - this concentrates the salts in the leaf margins causing the damage - it is why you never see trees in the ground with the same leaf damage.

Positioning and soil make up can help a lot - i use a fair bit of akadama and kanuma as they hold moisture, plus the tree sits with the maples rather than the pines. This kept the leaves reasonable for most of the summer but I had been feeding very hard so a tiny bit iof scorching had occured by autumn.

Leaf colour:
the leaves are the perfect indicator of pot and soil conditions - yellow leaves or green veins with yellow margins show deficiencies, and these are not always just nitrogen. These beeches seem to need higher PK levels than many other trees so I supplement the organic slow release feed with a Canna PK  additive. 2012 was incredibly wet and so much nutrition was washed through the soil - also it was a hard year to get organic feeds working properly as they need warm temperatures to break down properly and supply the tree with usable nutrition. Looking at the pictures I managed to keep the yellow leaves at bay until Autumn with constant feeding, then they went yellow as nature intended.

 

I'm happy with the 12 months

mossing about

 

Following on from the last post about the Hinoki today (new years day) has been a beautiful sunny day so I got up on the roof to collect moss to get the tree ready for the Noelanders show.

Here are the stages I use to keep the humidity up and to keep the moss in perfect condition over the travelling, setting up and the show itself.

 

First out comes the blender (not Mandies one !)

 

then add fresh sphagnum moss and chop until it is nice and fine

 

 

Next add some water to make a moss soup. If you have used dried moss this needs to sit and soak for quite a few hours but if you used fresh moss there is no need to wait.

 

Now it is time to cover the bonsai soil with a layer of the soup - the water drains through leaving a nice even layer of chopped moss. This gives a perfect underlayer to add the surface moss.

 

 

 

Now its time to get creative - I decided to go for a fully mossed surface rather than patches but tried to use different colours, textures and species to create interest

 

 

Final job is to put a net over to stop the birds undoing all the work.

December jobs

Having a few days off over Christmas is getting a few essential tree jobs done. Earlier in the year I submit a picture for consideration in the Noelanders show and it was accepted so the guy wires were removed 2 weeks ago to see if the branches would hold in place (I didn't want to have them removed on show day and the branches pop up ! I think if this happens it is better to leave them in place).

The two guyed branches had been hollowed underneath completely out of sight 4 months ago, and the combination of wire holding and branch healing has set them perfectly. If just a wire had been used the tree would keep springing back for a year or more.

As the branches were holding properly the upward new growth tips were wired flat and the algae washed from the bark. I few smaller branches were moved a little to balance the gaps and foliage pads but on the whole the tree has been kept as natural as possible. I felt the lower branch on the right was a little too long in the submision picture so I shortened it a few inches. I'm pleased with how the tree responded last year - lots of my bonsai food, the root reduction and repotting, the rain......the tree seemed to thrive through it all and has come on so far over the 4 years I've been styling it.

The pot is Tokoname, made at the Seizan kiln by Mr.KATAOKA Katsushi. This is a fairly old pot that was imported directly to the UK by Anne Swinton some years ago. It was home to her Ginko for many years and is the actual pot pictured with the Ginko in her book. Over time that tree was sold but died, another tree (juniper) ended up in the pot and I bought it, so got the pot. Funnily enough I didn't know about the pots history until a few years later but soon wanted the pot for a better tree, so out came the juniper !. The hinoki has been repotted 3 times in 4 years, smaller each time, and every timee the pot has been a mass of new roots. I may let the tree go 2yrs to restrict the roots a bit and slow the vigour - this will tighten the foliage up in future years

 Finding a nice stand here isn't that easy, especially for larger trees so I bought one from Japan and had it shipped over. The service from J Bonsai (bonsai network japan) https://jbons252.securesites.com/ssl_index.html was superb and the stand was in the UK in 3 days. Then it takes the UK delivery service over a week due to xmas getting in the way but the main think is it is here, in perfect condition and in time for the show.

The roof at the side of our house has a fair bit of lovely silver moss on it so new years day I will get the roof ladder out and collect some to moss the pot. Then i will liquidise some fresh sphagnum moss and mix it with water, spread a thin layer on the soil and add the surface moss on top. This is a little more work but keeps the top dressed moss looking so much better as there are several days involved with the Noelanders show. Equally importantly the Hinoki does not like drying out so the sphagnum layer keeps up humidity while the tree is traveling and in the show.

Two other xmas projects are on the go too, so more posts to follow very soon.

The Year of the Juniper

 

2013 will be my year of the juniper - - lots of styling practice in the first few months just in case the EBA final tree happens to be a juniper !! plus there is some great material to work with both here already and on the near horizon.

The first tree is great - the sort of material that you dont just stumble over every day. (pic S. Tolley)

This is a yamadori tree grafted with Itiogawa foliage in Japan. The tree came back into Europe with Mario Komsta after one of his japanese visits. It found its way to Steve Tolley via Noelanders sales area, then to me ! The attraction to the material ? - the trunk is a beautiful wind sculpted flute, the foliage is good variety, the pot is very good and most importantly it is an unstyled piece of japanese raw material.

First thing was to wash and brush down the trunk, then I decided to clean it up with the sand blaster

 

The blasting cleaned the old build up of Lime sulphur from the grooves in the wood, adding more texture to the tree. I decided to make my own mark on the styling and carve the trunk a bit to add some depth and depressions to the large mostly flat area. Working slowly with small tungsten carbide dremel bits I hollowed right through the trunk and extended a few grooves along the trunk, working with the natural ripples and grain.

 

After a rough carve, the next job was removing signs of the work, so a circular wire brush was fitted to the dremel and the edges softened, The final texture was added with a scalpel and a razor blade working some fine cracks into the natural grooves in the wood. I painted the deadwood with water, then straight away with Lime Sulphur, now it will be left to dry out so the wood shrinks and the cracks open up a bit more.

The pot.
I knew it was a really nice pot when looking at the tree, but wasn't until I put the tree in the car I saw the nail signature in the bottom. I drew a blank trying to look up the details so asked for help on the forum and  the initial response from Ryan was exciting to say the least.

The pot is from the Gyozan kiln - and initial thoughts were Nakano Yuuji



 

 

The next day there was an update from japan

 

nekotoban on Wed Nov 28, 2012 1:38 pm

"I THINK this pot made by Nakano Yukizo Gyozan himself, not his son Yuji.

 

The kugibori(nail signature) can be read as follows.
Right: His Imperial Majesty
Middle: Commemoration for the Emperor's accession for the imperial throne
Left: Nakano Gyozan made

I believe this pot was made when the Emperor Akihito had acceded to the throne."

 

This makes this a special commemorative pot made in 1990 by the Gyozan Kiln. I was told "This kiln is renowned for producing some of the very finest unglazed pots in Japan, along with Suzuki Syuzan and perhaps Kamiya Ryuen they are reputed for making the finest unglazed pots in Japan"

 

 

I need to be carefull with it, as non commemorative pots this size apparently cost 150-200 k¥. (This must be my lucky tree as the pot value had been overlooked as the tree moved across Europe - but tree and pot will stay together, that is only right) The tree will deserve the best styling possible - and I'm planning another bespoke root stand. Here it is on the big stand I made for the big slanting juniper

 

 

Ready to wire - It will go in the car nice and easily so I'll take the tree to the Ryan Neil workshop early next year.

 

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Juniper project 2

This will be the large juniper communis - it really fills the car so I dont think Mandy will want it poking her in the ear on the trip up North so I'm going to work this tree slowly over the next couple of years rather than take it to the workshop. I have been deliberating and the communis doesnt want any wire on secondary branches or it will suffer massive die back, while the workshop environment is about wiring and styling. I have decided the tree is too precious to risk so am keeping it at home - I want to change the planting angle so plan to repot in spring - then let it recover and carry on acclimatising to Cornwall for all next year. I'll place a couple of the key branches with guy wires  and feed / prune to trigger lots more budding.

 

It reminds me of my Juniper Rigida - I waited 4 years to 1st style it and the tree is responding so well to the slow pace of work.

 

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The mouthwatering temptations

 

These are the type of material trees I'm currently drooling over and hoping to be lucky enough to aquire one in the forthcoming 'year of the juniper'

 

 

 

My Day - Sunday 14th Oct

My day was centered on the FOBBS Bonsai talent contest final - held at Capel Manor bonsai show.

This post is picture based and are a few from the day. The contest was 3 hours  long and the winner is going on to represent the UK in the European final

 

The tree.........I'm happy !

 

looking..............

Looking closer..........................

 

Mickey looking too................

I'm still looking.........the tree is in there, I'm not rushing until i find it............

we have lift off.............................

 

 

 

 

Three hours flew by, but a few little tweaks and we came in on time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And I managed to win..............Here is the tree as it was styled in the 3 hours

 

 

 Thanks to all involved (I kept plenty of green bits :-) )

 

 

Slipped into an Erin Pot, little bit of moss and 10 minutes more tweaking