Maple Bonsai

A few years ago I spent some time looking at photos of bonsai trees, and being quite inspired.  I think at that time I had already noticed a small red maple seedling in my front garden.  I had hoped it was an offspring of my red Japanese maple, but it didn't have the same leaves.  However, it did look like it had a weeping form, rather than an upright one.  Anyhow, about that time, I actually searched for and bought a bonsai pot, for when I was ready to try my hand at it.

A couple of weeks ago, I finally dug up that small maple, which has grown in the past few years, but has a really beautiful shape, even without manipulating it.  Here it is, after planting it up.  It is a deep red color, not glowing, as the photo would indicate, since it was taken in the evening with artificial lights on it.

I have not tried to manipulate it any further, yet.  At this point, I have it in a sheltered location in my garden, and am monitoring that it stays well watered, and will settle into its little pot.  Once it safely settles in, I will take another good look at the shape of it, and what I would like to alter.  But I already like it quite a lot.

We had the privilege to visit China in March, and I got a few photos of the bonsai collection in the "Humble Administrator's Garden" in Suzhou (near Shanghai):

Here are a couple more photos from the garden, which was quite peaceful, even though there were lots of people everywhere, even on a rainy day :

One these days, I'll sort out some technical difficulties, and post more photos from China.  We had a wonderful trip, visiting Beijing, Xi'an, Qingdao, and Shanghai (including nearby Suzhou and Wuzhen).

Bonsai Inspiration

Even with the mild weather allowing me to get started on Spring cleanup in the garden, my imagination is still captured by the idea of trying out the art of bonsai.

In addition to the Reader's Digest "Bonsai Secrets" by Peter Chan which I recently brought home from the public library, I decided to "surf" for some more ideas on varieties of plants and bonsai styles.

There were some nice examples of bonsai which caught my eye, many of them on a site called The Art of Bonsai Project. Some of my favourites are shown here.

Bucida spinosa (Black olive), from this page

Azalea "Nisho no Hikari" by Wolfgang Putz, on this page

Pinus mugo (Mugo pine) by Walter Pall, on this page

Acer palmatum (Japanese maple) by Walter Pall, on this page

Juniperis chinensis (Chinese juniper) by Cheng Cheng-Kung, on this page

Pyracantha (Firethorn) by Robert Kempinski, on this page

Ulmus parvifolia (Chinese elm) by Qingquan Zhao, on this page

Ficus nerifolia (Weeping ficus) by Ed Trout, on this page

Cotoneaster by Dan Barton, on this page

"Meyers" juniper by Dan Barton, on this page

I hope these images will stir and inspire you, as they did me. For any of you who own or have created bonsai, I would love to see photos. Please feel free to post links in the comments section.

Bonsai Styles

I never had much interest in bonsai before, but recently (maybe with the Winter depriving me of time in the garden) I have started to toy with the idea of trying it out. So I looked at some bonsai books at the library the other night. Most of them were quite boring, and some had examples which I wouldn't consider bonsai, just little constrained trees.

Then I opened the Reader's Digest "Bonsai Secrets" by Peter Chan, and I couldn't put it down. It has some beautiful examples of bonsai, and techniques all the way from choosing the tree variety and style of pot, to the various techniques of growing, shaping, pruning, watering, and maintaining the bonsai, to the advanced techniques of creating driftwood effects ("jins" and "sharis"), grafting, and trunk thickening. I didn't know there were bonsai with berries and fruits (sadly, no photo of this) and flowers.  Pretty cool.  I was fascinated by one section which shows a juniper bought from a nursery, before (in its gallon pot) and after drastic trimming and wiring and repotting into a bonsai pot. Pretty cool, and pretty inspiring.

I really liked these 3 pages, which show different shapes of bonsai.

I'm inspired enough to want to try something.  So I dug out some Japanese maple seeds which I collected maybe 6 years ago (I hope they're still good), and have winter sown these in a plastic tray outside.  I'll need to take a look for bonsai pots (I suspect I won't want to pay the price for them, but I'll take a look at what I can get away with), and maybe look for a nursery plant (like that juniper example) which I could try my hand at radically pruning & shaping.  Also, I'll need to figure out where I'd keep such a thing.  I'm usually not much for keeping pots of any kind.

Today was a mild spring-like day, so I was able to spend a half hour or so in the front yard, cleaning up leaves and pulling old straw-like blades out of my ornamental blue oat grasses so I can see the blue-green colour again.  So pretty soon the urge to try out the bonsai will compete with my urge to lose myself in the garden.  Perhaps I can work on the bonsai after it gets dark.

Anyhow, I'd highly recommend this book, if you want to be inspired by the art of bonsai.