Dwarf Alberta Spruce, for practice

[mikemking]

While I'm focusing on learning care and health and growing techniques with my other, younger trees, I decided to pick up this cheap DAS at Home Depot so I could practice some pruning and styling. And if I make a mistake or end up killing the tree, no big deal.

It's still in the 1 gallon nursery container, I cleaned up little shoots around the bottom of the trunk so I could see what I have to work with a little better. Here's a look from various angles.

 

[mikemking]

Couldn't attach to the original post for some reason...

 

[Attmos]

While I'm focusing on learning care and health and growing techniques with my other, younger trees, I decided to pick up this cheap DAS at Home Depot so I could practice some pruning and styling. And if I make a mistake or end up killing the tree, no big deal.

It's still in the 1 gallon nursery container, I cleaned up little shoots around the bottom of the trunk so I could see what I have to work with a little better. Here's a look from various angles.

What is a DAS?

 

[mikemking]

What is a DAS?

Dwarf Alberta Spruce

 

[Wulfskaar]

What are your plans for this?

I'm also messing with one, and am told that if you plan to wire the branches down, be aware that it may take many years of wiring to actually get a branch to stay down. Mine is a wiring mess and will be for a long time.

Check out Nigel Saunders' tree, where he is only pruning into shape. He pinches the tips of new growth to get budding further back, and focuses on pruning upward-pointing growth instead of using wire. I think his tree is quite attractive and healthy looking.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

@mikemking - Dwarf Alberta Spruce (DAS) have unique traits that make them unfit for bonsai. They will teach you NOTHING relevant about training bonsai other than perhaps how to keep up on watering a tree. I recommend either planting this in your landscape and forgetting it. Or composting it. Branches will not hold their shape, they will spring up and reach for the sky even after many years of being wired and re-wired. This frustration will poison your view of the usefulness of wire to shape bonsai.

For the same price, you easily could have bought a Black Hills Spruce. Or at most 20% more expensive. It is the same species of spruce as DAS, Picea glauca, but it is the Black Hills ecotype, described or labeled as a subspecies. Picea glauca densata, It is EXCELLENT for bonsai. Branches will lignify and hold their shape after only one or two years of wiring. This spruce is will teach you how to care for all the other more delicate spruces. It tolerates heat a lot better than englemann spruce, though it is not a desert tree.

Please, invest in a Black Hills Spruce, and stop wasting time with DAS.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

That said

For DAS, choose a style that uses the upright growth habit of the branches. Trying to get horizontal or down swept branches is futility.

Sorry if I came off a bit harsh. Just being honest.

And while "okay" for beginners, the Nigel Saunder's videos are not considered particularly authoritative on anything Bonsai. Better are the Ryan Neil, Bjorn Bjornholm and other videos. My favorites are the Bjorn videos.

Eisei-en Bonsai

The official channel of bonsai professional Bjorn L Bjorholm and Eisei-en Bonsai Garden, currently being built in Kyoto, Japan. Watch bonsai vlogs, demos, and instructional tutorials all about bonsai art. For more information, please visit: https://eisei-en.com...

www.youtube.com

 

[Wulfskaar]

That said

For DAS, choose a style that uses the upright growth habit of the branches. Trying to get horizontal or down swept branches is futility.

Sorry if I came off a bit harsh. Just being honest.

And while "okay" for beginners, the Nigel Saunder's videos are not considered particularly authoritative on anything Bonsai. Better are the Ryan Neil, Bjorn Bjornholm and other videos. My favorites are the Bjorn videos.

Eisei-en Bonsai

The official channel of bonsai professional Bjorn L Bjorholm and Eisei-en Bonsai Garden, currently being built in Kyoto, Japan. Watch bonsai vlogs, demos, and instructional tutorials all about bonsai art. For more information, please visit: https://eisei-en.com...

www.youtube.com

Very few of those videos show anything about working with cheap nursery stock. Not very helpful to those of us who are just starting with cheap stock.

 

[mikemking]

Sorry if I came off a bit harsh. Just being honest.

Thanks. I have read the things you mentioned. As I said, this is a tree for practicing pruning and shaping; developing my vision for seeing what the material presents, learning how to wire. And if I make a mistake or kill it, no big deal.

 

[mikemking]

What are your plans for this?

I'm also messing with one, and am told that if you plan to wire the branches down, be aware that it may take many years of wiring to actually get a branch to stay down. Mine is a wiring mess and will be for a long time.

Check out Nigel Saunders' tree, where he is only pruning into shape. He pinches the tips of new growth to get budding further back, and focuses on pruning upward-pointing growth instead of using wire. I think his tree is quite attractive and healthy looking.

Thanks, I'll check it out.

My plan is to see what the tree gives me. Learn how to use the tools. Learn how to apply wire (even if it's ineffective).

Probably upright, maybe some slight movement in the trunk if it's there. I do see that the trunk splits in two about half way. Not sure if I want to do something with that or not. I've been looking for examples and seems like most people do formal upright.

 

[Attmos]

Dwarf Alberta Spruce

Thanks. Was the title always "Dwarf Alberta Spruce"? ....if so I apologize for the ridiculous question.

 

[rockm]

Best way to get these things to hold horizontal branching is to scar the underside of the branch-or the top side doesn’t really make that much difference.

Will only work on larger branches get a knife and scrape off the bark and cambium down to bare wood on a 1/2-1/4 inch long by 1/4 or so wide patch WHERE THE BRANCH MEETS THE TRUNK

Wires the branch into place. Let the branch grow. The resulting callus tissue can be enough to hold the branch in place. Of course if you scrape too much on a branch that’s tooo small you can kill the branch. Worth experimenting with

The callus will take a year at least depending on the branch to set

 

[Wulfskaar]

Best way to get these things to hold horizontal branching is to scar the underside of the branch-or the top side doesn’t really make that much difference.

Will only work on larger branches get a knife and scrape off the bark and cambium down to bare wood on a 1/2-1/4 inch long by 1/4 or so wide patch WHERE THE BRANCH MEETS THE TRUNK

Wires the branch into place. Let the branch grow. The resulting callus tissue can be enough to hold the branch in place. Of course if you scrape too much on a branch that’s tooo small you can kill the branch. Worth experimenting with

The callus will take a year at least depending on the branch to set

I think I may have inadvertently done that on one or two branches that I wired last fall.

When I redid the wiring this weekend, a couple branches stayed put. One definitely appears to have suffered damage on top, as it's currently covered in sap.

 

[mikemking]

I did some pruning to thin things out a bit so I could see some structure. I haven't wired or shaped anything. I've identified what I see as two possible fronts. I kind of like that lowest branch, but not sure what I can do with it.

Any suggestions are appreciated. I plan on wiring this weekend.

I'm not going to repot at this time.

 

[canoeguide]

I'm convinced that wiring DAS is futile and have personally never attempted it with the couple of trees I have. But, I think DAS can achieve convincing representations of eastern white pine, especially those growing around windswept locations in the Great lakes.

The best use of DAS seems to be in group plantings or forests, and there are some pretty good examples around.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

I'm convinced that wiring DAS is futile and have personally never attempted it with the couple of trees I have. But, I think DAS can achieve convincing representations of eastern white pine, especially those growing around windswept locations in the Great lakes.

The best use of DAS seems to be in group plantings or forests, and there are some pretty good examples around.

I agree that DAS are okay in forest and group plantings. As a stand in for old eastern white pine, they don't match my observations from Wisconsin and Michigan. EWP have horizontal lower branches. Yes, upper branches reach up, but the lower 2/3 of an old EWP the branches are near horizontal, near impossible to maintain with DAS.

We all have only so many hours a day or week to use on our hobby, unnecessarily difficult species are a "time suck" or a waste of time. The perpetually springy upward reaching growth of DAS is only good for a design where all the branches reach for the sky. The typical "ancient tree' look, pretty much regardless of species has lower branches either dropping below horizontal, or horizontal. The point of bonsai is to generate an image that has the impact of an ancient tree. A 'dropped branch" goes a long way to creating this. Not possible with DAS. So why fight with a cultivar, when much better cultivars are just as available. Please look for Black Hills Spruce. A much better alternative.

 

[Tony D.]

My plan is to see what the tree gives me. Learn how to use the tools. Learn how to apply wire (even if it's ineffective).

A DAS may or may not be a suitable tree to develop into a prize bonsai but you have plainly expressed your intentions and I feel time spent learning to use the tools and develop your imagination to see the potential of any given tree is well spent.

I may not have a lot of experience in the art of bonsai but I've used tools all of my life; I know it takes practice to learn the feel and techniques particularly to any tools. A would be woodworker may practice using a plane or chisel on a scrap 2x4.

Perhaps your time could be applied to a more appropriate tree, but whatever...work with what you got. You can use what you learn on a tree you may come to love in the future.

 

[mikemking]

A DAS may or may not be a suitable tree to develop into a prize bonsai but you have plainly expressed your intentions and I feel time spent learning to use the tools and develop your imagination to see the potential of any given tree is well spent.

I may not have a lot of experience in the art of bonsai but I've used tools all of my life; I know it takes practice to learn the feel and techniques particularly to any tools. A would be woodworker may practice using a plane or chisel on a scrap 2x4.

Perhaps your time could be applied to a more appropriate tree, but whatever...work with what you got. You can use what you learn on a tree you may come to love in the future.

Thanks Tony! This is exactly my approach.

I appreciate the folks in this thread trying to steer beginners away from DAS for all the reasons stated. But this is what I have, I already bought it, so I'm going to work with it. The other species mentioned aren't readily available to me.

For ~$10, this tree has already taught me that I need to have more of a plan before I start snipping, and that I shouldn't just remove the smallest branches. That was a cheap lesson.

I'm not hoping to turn this tree into a show piece. I'm hoping to learn how to prune, and apply wire. And if something nice comes out of it great. If I make a mess of it, so be it. If I kill it, well better this than something I got emotionally invested in.

I have other trees. I'm not ready to butcher them with my inexperience.

 

[mikemking]

Well, here's what I ended up with. I'm glad I had some cheap, probably throwaway material.

• I think I pruned away too much, and didn't pair branches well
• I think I did a poor job wiring

Any feedback is welcome

 

[Attmos]

Well, here's what I ended up with. I'm glad I had some cheap, probably throwaway material.

• I think I pruned away too much, and didn't pair branches well
• I think I did a poor job wiring

Any feedback is welcome

Cut the top down to the second branch.