Bonsai Bucket List

[Adair M]

Do you have a "bucket list" of trees you want?

When I started bonsai, I wanted one of everything, in every possible style!

Well, that proved to be unmanageable.

So, I've now limited my "wish list".

I'll share my list, whether I have one or not.

Please limit your lists to ten items, just to keep it sane!

My list:

Informal Upright JBP -yes
Formal Upright JBP -yes
Zuisho JWP -yes
Atlas Cedar -yes
Shohin azalea -yes
Ume -yes
Root over rock trident -yes
Large zelkova broom -no
Nice shimpaku -yes
Killer shohin trident -no

I have other trees, but I'm at the point where I have enough to keep me busy. So, I will have to sell some some if I see something I like better than what I already have.

 

[Arcto]

Just clarifying, a tree actually in training? Or maybe that 30 gal monster someone hauled home from the nursery this morning? Do corpses count?

 

[Cotyledon]

Yew.

 

[sorce]

1. BVF Hawthorne
2. BVF Hawthorne
3. BVF Hawthorne
Is this getting creepy yet?

White Pine.
Any dope unworked Juniper.
Black Pine.
Cork Elm.
Trident.
Ginkgo.
Bald Cypress.
Tamarack....ah shit, yeah it died!
Hackberry.

Sorce

 

[qwade]

Formal or Informal Ginkgo with nice nebari and trunk.

 

[PaulH]

I already have a lot of trees that I love so I'll just list those I don't have but would like to:

Top quality Trident (with excellent nebari, taper, ramification, and no scars) .
Informal upright White pine on its own roots.
Rocky Mountain Juniper with great deadwood.
Big Bald Cypress chokkan.
Needle juniper with gnarly deadwood.
Crape Myrtle with good nebari, taper, and ramification.
Big Korean Hornbeam with good nebari, taper and ramification.
Nice crab apple with tiny fruit.
California or Sierra Juniper with Kishu foliage grafted on to a great trunk.
Twisty old Manzanita with lots of deadwood. (the impossible dream!)

 

[amcoffeegirl]

1 stunning show ready willow leaf ficus
2 cascade willow leaf ficus
3 mame or shohin Broom chinese elm
4 ginko biloba
More ficus shohin and mame
5 small cotoneaster
Maybe a maple?
Maybe a silver birch?

 

[quietobserver]

Mall-sai with glued down rocks, mudman and water feature

s-curve chinese elm

pom-pom styled hinoki

tiger bark ficus in a half s-curve

Poorly grafted chateau depot maple

White gumpo azalea, 1 gallon with 42 "trunks"

Ebay pine with Schwarzenegger-esque inverse taper

 

[sorce]

White gumpo azalea, 1 gallon with 42 "trunks

Hey I didn't post that one did I?
Oh yeah it only has about 18 trunks!

Damn it and I like that one!

small cotoneaster

I'm gonna need a bigger bucket!

Sorce

 

[coh]

I'd like to have a really nice root-over-rock something (maybe a trident) someday. You know, the kind where the roots mold to the rock in interesting, intricate patterns...not the often-seen root-over-rock where there are maybe one or two clumsy roots that look like they don't really want to be there.

Would like to have a naturalistic, medium to large size maple...trident or japanese...you know, something that looks like a tree you'd see out in a field somewhere.

Chinese quince with a decent trunk that flakes well, showing great mottled color...also blooming and fruiting. Maybe my favorite species.

A really stunning literati, don't care so much about the species (maybe juniper or pine). You know, the kind of tree that stops you in your tracks, that looks so easy to style...but you know it isn't!

A nice forest/group planting, again species not all that important.

Would like to have one really nice pine and one really nice juniper, something that I can spend all day pinching

Many others as well, but those come to mind right now.

 

[M. Frary]

Tamarack

Have to remedy that for you. Next spring. Bigger one. Sorry dude! Crap!

 

[Vin]

Only two off the top of my head, both of which I cannot have in my zone:

1. Larch – (In the style of Hans Van Meer's “The Elephant”)
2. Contorted Ponderosa Pine

 

[sorce]

Have to remedy that for you. Next spring. Bigger one. Sorry dude! Crap!

No, I'm sorry for breaking it like this!
It was my fault all day.

Sorce

 

[M. Frary]

Still......

 

[Smoke]

I'd like the bucket

the list...

...and the remote control.

ohhh and this lamp!

 

[Eric Group]

I want a big nasty informal upright Trident. Not necessarily like a 4 foot monster.. Even a medium sized tree with a nice heavy trunk, good movement and good taper would be fine. I am in the process of trying to grow a few out, but nothing is close to what I want yet.

I still want a nice JBP, and while I have two in the ground, I don't know for sure if they'd ill get to be what I want in a reasonable time frame...

Wanted a big Yamadori project- GOT ONE this Summer... Water Elm- MASSIVE! Sprouting all over now!

Wanted bigger/ better azaleas and some with multi- colored blooms- GOT THEM this Spring when I visited an azalea farm in the area. Miyuki is my favorite of the ones I got I think...

Wanted a "regular old Chinese Elm"- got a cool one from a friend last year, and made a bunch of cuttings this Spring...

Wanted a twisty juniper... Not willing to spend thousands to get one, so I am neck deep in about 4 different projects to make my own! Two or three larger ones wired up and two where I am starting them from a bunch of cuttings being grafted together...


Basically all the other wants on my list are either already in the works or in Bonsai pots in my back yard at this point. I do still want a nice, big Bald Cypress... The one I got this Summer may not make it.

 

[Djtommy]

What i want most now is space to put the trees i want, like big j maple, ezo matsu,..

 

[Smoke]

I want a big nasty informal upright Trident. Not necessarily like a 4 foot monster.. Even a medium sized tree with a nice heavy trunk, good movement and good taper would be fine. I am in the process of trying to grow a few out, but nothing is close to what I want yet.

I still want a nice JBP, and while I have two in the ground, I don't know for sure if they'd ill get to be what I want in a reasonable time frame...

Wanted a big Yamadori project- GOT ONE this Summer... Water Elm- MASSIVE! Sprouting all over now!

Wanted bigger/ better azaleas and some with multi- colored blooms- GOT THEM this Spring when I visited an azalea farm in the area. Miyuki is my favorite of the ones I got I think...

Wanted a "regular old Chinese Elm"- got a cool one from a friend last year, and made a bunch of cuttings this Spring...

Wanted a twisty juniper... Not willing to spend thousands to get one, so I am neck deep in about 4 different projects to make my own! Two or three larger ones wired up and two where I am starting them from a bunch of cuttings being grafted together...


Basically all the other wants on my list are either already in the works or in Bonsai pots in my back yard at this point. I do still want a nice, big Bald Cypress... The one I got this Summer may not make it.

Whats your price range? 2 to 4 hundred? Maybe I can help......

 

[Arcto]

A nice artificial silk plant bonsai. Something that even I can't figure out how to kill.

 

[carp]

Pemphis acidula - truthfully even cuttings would be dope
Juniperus rigida - shohin knotted trunk
Fortunella hindsii - shohin semi cascade
Hibiscus tilliaceus - imperial sized yamadori
Buxus harlandii - shohin, chuhin
Osteomeles subrotunda - shohin informal upright, semi cascade
Rosa multiflora - shohin
Diospyros rhombifolia - shohin
Lycium barbarum - shohin
Gardenia jasminoides 'Radicans' - shohin