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Bonsai care from a different perspective |
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There is no way I can write anything that has not already been written before about bonsai care, cultivation, wiring, etc. We currently sell 6 books on this web site out of hundreds available and on top of that there are 1000s of articles on the internet, so I'm not going to try to tell you about techniques already written and documented by masters; what I am going to try and do is tell you my experiences, my learning circle and hopefully encourage you into this wonderful hobby/lifestyle.
As a plant collector, I always admired bonsai and a good few years ago I did buy a couple of trees.
The trees I bought, as I remember, were a maple and a wisteria. At the time I was living in a flat and the plants were going to live on a window ledge along with my budding cacti collection. I bought the plants on a sunny summer Friday afternoon, took them home, gave them pride of place on my windowsill, watered them and then went away for the weekend. I returned on the Sunday evening and didn't give them a thought until Monday morning. On Monday morning I opened the curtains to inspect my wonderful trees to discover to my horror two dry twigs with frizzled leaves sitting in the pots...
They were completely dead and from that moment so was my short-lived venture into bonsai.
Many moons passed and my collection of cacti increased. Julie, my partner now for some years, is a bonsai enthusiast and we decided we would like to make a living from trading the plants we love.
Our garden was soon full of bonsai trees of all shapes and sizes and there were lots of books around telling all the secrets of successful growing and showing all the wonderful tools (I am a carpenter so I have always had a love of fine tools), pots and techniques. I sat and read the books cover to cover repeatedly and even though now it mostly makes sense, at the time I found the whole thing confusing and terrifying. You must remember this is coming from a cactus man, the thought of taking a plant out of its pot, raking off the soil, cutting away a third of the roots then re planting it and watering it is about as alien to a cactus collector as you can get! That treatment would surely kill off just about any cactus in a matter of days. Even though I now know better it still gives me an uncomfortable feeling.
With all the trees around I soon started to put a few aside that I liked & I was not too sure we should sell just yet; also a fine collection of pots was forming, I had about 3 pots for every tree, but at that time I was scared to repot them :O(
These trees sat and were watered and fed and as I was terrified to go near them with scissors they started to turn into bonsai shrubs. Julie is responsible for the majority of sale trees and I'm responsible for the trees that I was not too sure it was time to sell.
However, my addiction was growing, so when we went on buying trips to nurseries I would see trees I thought we should buy to retail, but on returning home they would find their way into my area.
Soooooooo one fine sunny afternoon and after a few glasses of wine, my courage arrived! I took a large elm, put it on the table in front of me, and looked at it for while. I thought about the pictures in the books and trees I had seen in displays and decided on a course of action, ...then put it safely back with the others as I have done many times before!! But somehow I knew today was the day; I retrieved it and started work.
I started very slowly snipping away at the over grown branches (with my previously unused, but regularly admired Japanese scissors) to form in my mind "clouds". I didn't give a thought to trimming off 1 leaf at the top, 2 leaves at the side, or of not cutting through leaves. But as I worked it all became much clearer and I began to work faster. As I worked, I started to see the branches that needed to be wired into my clouds, others that needed to bend in other directions and those that should not be there at all.
After a few hours, I sat back finished.... I have to say I was impressed with my work and I had also enjoyed it immensely, I was just a little worried about what Julie (she had been banned from the area) would think when she saw my handiwork. Julie was suitably impressed and this gave me a huge boost in confidence.
Over the next week I started to read the books again, they now made so much more sense, and I was able to refine the work I had started on the elm by cutting next to a leaf not through it, etc.
For all of you people starting out I have to say after that first tree, it all became a lot clearer and my confidence grew enormously.
Over the next few weeks, I shaped and wired a juniper that had been going a bit wild and started on some mungo pines, a Larch and a white pine, now beginning to use many of the techniques I had read about.
During all my years of growing cacti I learned from books and would occasionally ask a few questions when visiting a nursery and be told what I needed to know. I also had grown 100s of seedlings, and a few deaths from mistakes and experiments did not really matter. I did once join the local cactus society as at that time they had wonderful metal & enamel badges and as a collector I had to have one. I attended a couple of meetings, but it wasn't for me, as it seemed to me that most of the people there were buyers of already grown specimens and were more concerned with winning the local show, or over the correct Latin pronunciation, rather than actually talking about the growing of the plants (I know this is not the same at every club and I am sure there are some wonderful clubs out there, this was just my experience). Over the years I have become a good grower of cacti, I lose very few and never have any trouble flowering my ariocarpus etc, but I don't think you can learn this way with bonsai trees. Unlike cacti, bonsai trees need constant care and you are limited in what you can learn from books, in this hobby you really need to see some of the techniques first hand and have them explained and be able to ask questions.
I have been fortunate I have Julie to discuss it with and when in doubt I have Jim. Jim has been a bonsai collector for many years and has one of the finest collections of mature trees I have seen in a private collection.
Jim has become a great friend and teacher, taking my learning quite a few steps further ahead and I hope in return I have increased his knowledge of cacti.
Think about it: you have spent a few 100 pounds on a beautiful white pine, it needs constant pruning to stop it getting leggy and you need to encourage back budding, etc. You can read the techniques in many books, but are you really going to go out there book in hand and start snapping off candles, wiring and hoping you are going to get it right?
In bonsai, after your first few trees and unless you are as fortunate as I to have a great teacher, you really need to join a club to gain this experience, I think you will find different people to the ones I met at my cactus club, this I believe is because the trees are hands on and these guys are only too happy to show off and show you what's what.
I hope by writing this article that I have encouraged you in your bonsai hobby, or helped to start you on your way. If you have any questions feel free to drop us an email and if I can I will answer your questions, if not I will ask *Jim* and I bet he will have an answer. Like me, you might not always like it, but it will be an honest and accurate answer. :o)
It seems to me that all the books and manuals for beginners are written by experts, and I think at times when explaining things they forget they were once beginners; so if you have experiences and tips that you would like to share with others, send them to me and then I will be happy to add them to this section and between us, beginners, growers and enthusiasts, we can build an easy to understand place of reference.
I am also happy to include links to clubs and societies.
Lastly, thanks Jim for the hours and hours on the phone that you have endured while my knowledge has increased ten fold, it is really is appreciated mate.
© Divine Cactus 2006
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