One year torturing a walmart Retusa

Hi there,
Last year I bought a ficus retusa at Walmart. normally their so-called bonsai are ugly but I though this one was pretty cool and furthermore it was just $3.50.

Granted it had the really stinky hyper-develop S shape trunk but anyway I though I could try some interesting things with it.

The first thing I tried was to grow aerial roots. For that I cut a couple of branches and built a sort of tent around the trunk in order to keep it moist and hoping the roots will grow. Didn't work.

So I removed the tent and let it grow in it's training pot, close to a window, for a part of the winter (the picture of this steep isn't at the right place chronologically but you could understand which one it is; one could see snow by the window ) . Its root ball was gross with roots just on one side so I thought that in this pot it will grow more roots and they will be more equally disposed. Didn't work neither.

So I decided to try to ground layered it and put it in a half and half carton. The idea beneath that (because there was one) was to get some roots on the ground layer level and then shop the base that will have grow potential exposed roots in the meantime. Didn't work.

So I was kind of desperate and though 'too bad buddy, I want to get rid of the S shape and I will'
So as the ground layer was definitively a fail I just chopped it there, put some rooting hormone on the cut and just plant it in a regular cheap plastic pot.

And it worked

My ficus developed a nice ring of new roots with some very long ones.
I pruned them (and pruned the branches also) and plant the tree in a more suitable bonsai pot.
And now it is bad-budding like the though little guy he is!

Seems that my little guy is recovering pretty well of all the abuses he got from me so now that the super-S shape problem is resolved I'm starting to think about the 2nd flaw, that will be the sort of big interstate exchanger of branches circled in red in the picture.


For the moment I see several option.

The softest would be to do nothing about it and try to re-organize the branches by wiring, may be in a wind-sweep style even if I'm not a big fan of it.

That will be the yellow arrows showing the sense of the wind and the direction I'll try to give to the branches.

Another option, much more drastic, would be to chop the trunk, in 1 or even in 2.

I don't really like these options because: 1) I don't really care for wind-sweep, 2) if not wind-sweep then the re-orientation of the branches in order to get something nice would have to be huge with some motion going totally at the opposite of what they are for the moment, 3) chop the trunk like that scare me a little, i already put kind of some work on this guy, I'm not that comfortable with chopping it and hope it will bud back.


The last option I see for the moment would be to chop only the big node and keep some branches of the apex, in particular the 3 of them that are already well placed forming an equilateral triangle. The chopped would be in red and the 3 remaining branches are highlighted in blue.



What do you guys think of these options? Or do you have other/better ideas?

I would let it grow out a bit. Let it regain strength, build up roots. Feels like it has been too short since the rooting started.

After that.. I think I would start with the last option. Just keep in minnd a tree is a 3D thing. So just looking at the pictures MAY give a nice picture image, but may in real life look horrible.

I'd do like LB said and let her grow some.

Then, I'd look into making a cutting, even another Air layer off that sideways forest clump.

Looks like a good candidate for a fat base clump. Nothing sexier than a clump with a fat base!

Then let the bottom do something else to tell you what it wants.

Don't let it knuckle up anymore till then. Rub off the weak buds. Then reverse and rub the strong ones after it grows out.

Are you going to the MBS show this weekend? I'll be there Sunday!

Sorce

Just to share; I have a similar project, which I started 2 years ago, just to see whether a 6 euro/dollar fig could amount to anything in a very northern climate (I am about the same latitute as Adak, Alaska).

2 years as purchased:


After first trimming, wiring & repotting. Note the stump in the top is cut at an angle & over half the branches were removed


This was last winter, about 10 months ago, after a late-summer defoliation, with buds still expanding from bare branches:


Do not have any up to date pictures I am afraid. It is doing well, with a full canopy. Might take some pics when I am at home during daylight..

leatherback said:

I would let it grow out a bit. Let it regain strength, build up roots. Feels like it has been too short since the rooting started.

After that.. I think I would start with the last option. Just keep in minnd a tree is a 3D thing. So just looking at the pictures MAY give a nice picture image, but may in real life look horrible.

Click to expand...

sorce said:

I'd do like LB said and let her grow some.

Then, I'd look into making a cutting, even another Air layer off that sideways forest clump.

Looks like a good candidate for a fat base clump. Nothing sexier than a clump with a fat base!

Then let the bottom do something else to tell you what it wants.

Don't let it knuckle up anymore till then. Rub off the weak buds. Then reverse and rub the strong ones after it grows out.

Are you going to the MBS show this weekend? I'll be there Sunday!

Sorce

Click to expand...

Don't to worry guys the immediate action I'll pause on this tree is let it grow!
As I said I'm just in the process of thinking about what I'll do for this 'forest clump' but I won't do any drastic work.

@letherback: yes, that's more or less the kind of tree I had in mind with the 'chopping the head' philosophy.
Where are you in Germany? (I only went to Bremen and loved it)

@sorce: I love your comments in a general way but I really don't get them for the most part
Probably the reason why I love them
Are you in the Haiku on top of Bonsai in your Japanese path?
I'll have to print and decipher your message but I'm pretty sure that's close to some ideas I had for my little buddy

Tell me more about this MBS thingy please! I'd love to go and meet you there, whatever it is!

sorce said:

Are you going to the MBS show this weekend? I'll be there Sunday!

Sorce

Click to expand...

Ok, I understood that MBS meant 'Midwest Bonsai Society' (I though we were from the Great Lakes area )
I just spoke with my wife (the financial planer around here) and we'll go to the exhibit on Sunday!

I apologize.....
Beleive me I do.

It is all right there on the surface tho! And not!

Here's my thought for the clump.
Sorry I can only rotate and crop.


See you Sunday!

Sorce

sorce said:

I apologize.....
Beleive me I do.

It is all right there on the surface tho! And not!

Here's my thought for the clump.
Sorry I can only rotate and crop.
View attachment 79853

See you Sunday!

Sorce

Click to expand...

Yes that was my idea too!
And actually there is even a little bit more as the clump is wider than that (but you can't see it on my picture).

See you Sunday! I don't know at what time will go there (after our week-end trip to Starbucks that's for sure but then I don't know if it will be before or after lunch) you'll recognize us: I'm French with a specific French's face according to my wife and she is Peruvian with a specific Peruvian size according to me (some sort of bonsai herself in fact... )

Alain said:

Yes that was my idea too!
And actually there is even a little bit more as the clump is wider than that (but you can't see it on my picture).

See you Sunday! I don't know at what time will go there (after our week-end trip to Starbucks that's for sure but then I don't know if it will be before or after lunch) you'll recognize us: I'm French with a specific French's face according to my wife and she is Peruvian with a specific Peruvian size according to me (some sort of bonsai herself in fact... )

Click to expand...

I'll be the half French Polak with a Cuban Wife and the kids that won't stop doing whatever it is I gotta keep telling them to stop doing....climbing shit.. Swimming the koi pond!

I'll Probly be there all day. Look for the burning pocket, I'm trying to get something special!

Sorce

sorce said:

I'll be the half French Polak with a Cuban Wife and the kids that won't stop doing whatever it is I gotta keep telling them to stop doing....climbing shit.. Swimming the koi pond!

I'll Probly be there all day. Look for the burning pocket, I'm trying to get something special!

Sorce

Click to expand...

Sounds great, see you there!

leatherback said:

Might take some pics when I am at home during daylight

Click to expand...

Just managed to snap one. Full canopy, ready for a late-summer defoliation & wiring session, getting ready for 6 months indoor imprisonment..

Alain said:

Where are you in Germany?

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Nearest big city is Dusseldorf, 'bout an hours drive south.

leatherback said:

Just managed to snap one. Full canopy, ready for a late-summer defoliation & wiring session, getting ready for 6 months indoor imprisonment..
View attachment 80278

Nearest big city is Dusseldorf, 'bout an hours drive south.

Click to expand...

Oops I missed your answer, I've been all over the place with my bonsai since last week-end.

Nice foliage you've got there!

I think I resolve my dilemma concerning my own one: I'll snap it at the red line number one on the 1st picture.
Like that it may bud back on the trunk but if it doesn't then the branch on the back in the picture will become the new leader.

That's it, I chose the last option, I chop the cluster of branches and kept the 3 in equilateral triangle.



And I generously brushed the cutting with rooting hormone and planted it in a pot, may be I will have a baby ficus as the free gift for participating in the beheading of the mother tree...

Looking good!
Nice taper!

Sorce

Alain said:

That's it, I chose the last option, I chop the cluster of branches and kept the 3 in equilateral triangle.

View attachment 81316

And I generously brushed the cutting with rooting hormone and planted it in a pot, may be I will have a baby ficus as the free gift for participating in the beheading of the mother tree...

View attachment 81317

Click to expand...

As far as the cutting goes I've had 100 percent success without hormone so you'll probably have a new little fig.

aml1014 said:

As far as the cutting goes I've had 100 percent success without hormone so you'll probably have a new little fig.

Click to expand...

Unless you're like me and have less success with hormones.

I call root powder a reverse placebo.
It makes you think it'll work without after care and it dies cause you don't care for it.

Sorce

sorce said:

Unless you're like me and have less success with hormones.

I call root powder a reverse placebo.
It makes you think it'll work without after care and it dies cause you don't care for it.

Sorce

Click to expand...

I've never used it before, but I care for my trees religiously over anything else. Is the bad? Maybe, but u love my trees lol

aml1014 said:

As far as the cutting goes I've had 100 percent success without hormone so you'll probably have a new little fig.

Click to expand...

sorce said:

Unless you're like me and have less success with hormones.

I call root powder a reverse placebo.
It makes you think it'll work without after care and it dies cause you don't care for it.

Sorce

Click to expand...

@aml1014 : that's what I'm afraid of! My wife is ok with my invading hobby when it's all about local species that could be outside yearlong. She kind of have a trouble with exotics which have to hibernate inside and now I have: the mother tree retusa, a ginseng I bought just to really abuse it and see if it could stop being that ugly (this one may die actually), this cutting and a plan for more trees as we are going to my mother in law's in Miami for Thanksgiving.
Some serious diplomatic talks are in order in the near future

@sorce : to root the mother tree I just took care that the soil was always moist, I guess I'll do the same and we'll see...

BTW: thanks you guys for the comments!