Search results

After a couple chapters or sections in, I can say this. It's written like an encyclopedia. Each section is about a certain type of tree family and then each North American variety is discussed in brief, Some a bit longer than others, but the good part is that each is discussed with bonsai...

My brain must not be working tonight. The nursery I got most of my landscape trees is out of town, but has lots of older stuff, from buckets to boxes and the senior nurseryman has a long shed of bonsai experiments ! <facepalm>

Old nurseries with old stock, sounds like a good idea. If there were only one in my area. There is ONE that has been here a long time, and he used to have a lot of stock, but the last time I drove by, it was down sized. "Cal" wasn't a young guy a decade ago, when I was last there, so maybe...

My local Lowes has a good number of trees marked down 50%. I suppose it's hard to sell bare trees in the winter. Here are some that were of interest either due to interesting bark or leaves. Eastern Red Bud. Very pretty in the spring, but the leaves are generally pretty big. I'm actually...

I was going to talk to the forest service about a permit to collect wild stuff to see if I could get some California juniper. Chinese Elm grow here. I know Chinese Pistache and some Ash grow well enough here, as I have some large ones in my yard. The Elm are annoying, as they send out roots and...

As the topic states, how can you insure or tell that when you chop off the trunk, that anything will grow back ? I've seen some trees at the nursery that might have a good lower trunk and interesting roots, but in a 15 gal bucket, the tree is trained to be over 6 feet tall and not a branch to be...

Which one is that ? I have been to this one: http://www.kimsbonsai.com/ Hard to find ! He's behind an other house with a little sign by the road. Lot's of trees. Most were all junipers. Our hot desert climate and cold winters limit what does well here. He also had a fair amount of 1...

Thanks for the link. I have more reading ahead of me.

I just ordered the book from the abs site. 30 bucks plus shipping. Perhaps I'll give it a novice's review when I finish it.

http://www.amazon.com/Bonsai-Bible-definitive-choosing-growing/dp/1845339088/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1416199945&sr=1-7&keywords=bonsai By looking at the contents and samples, how does this book stack up ? I'm new, but I have seen the author's name mentioned frequently.

You mean I need to build a basement TOO ! :) I've got an acre of land to work with. I should be OK.

Ok, it was a play on an old potato chip commercial, but it get's the basic idea. If you are starting in the hobby, and you read books, and invest in tools, you can't only have ONE tree you're hoping to grow into something nice and bonsai , can you ? It would seem that once you get materials...

Pictures of 1 gal shrub Old Gold Juniper. How do you display them as thumb nails ? The 4th shot is the one that shows the trunks, but I was seeing how flexible they were and spread them apart somewhat. If you refer to the top picture, everything that extends passed...

I'm in the "high desert" of southern California. It will get below freezing a number of times during the winter. It's in the 60s during the day now. It may get near freezing at night soon. I'll take a picture or two tomorrow and post them.

By the way, what about soil composition ? More garden like or more fast drain bonsai soil like ?

The plant I picked is an "old gold" juniper. Probably it's official name is: Juniperus chinensis 'Old Gold. I have a question on initial shaping. I picked the shrub because it was not upright, but had a very obvious growth to one side of the pot. It could have been growing on it's side for...

I've read a few books on bonsai and tried to do some web research, but I am still unsure about a few things on this subject. I understand the goal is to get your tree to bulk up. What I am not clear on is when you start pruning and guiding the tree to it's shape and what type of soil you...

One example of a tree that goes, just up the mountain slopes from me is the California Juniper. It seems to grow in various forms, from a large wide bush, to a more upright tree form to some oddly gnarled forms. Doing a google search shows it is a popular bonsai species. I was going to check...

I really like a lot of his stuff. He has a good photographic style in documenting them too. I'd make some of his shots desktop backgrounds! What I like about his stuff is that much of it DOES look like a full sized tree and in a more believable way. How much does having rather LARGE bonsai help...

Perhaps I need to be more clear. In the basic concept, bonsai has, as one goal, to make a small tree look old. Then to have the shape and scale of branches, trunk and container to add to the look of a mature tree in shrunken form. However, I was not sure how much bonsai was about making the...

Since one of the goals of bonsai is to have a small tree look like a full grown mature tree, are there references with shots of what a given tree looks like, when it is all grown up. I suppose just Googling images with tree names would work, but not all mature trees are interesting to look at...

Try Amdro. It works great. http://www.amdro.com/

One tree I've always thought was very cool is the paperbark cherry. My web searches haven't turned up a bonsai specimen. Does anyone have a link to one ? Which brings up the question of ... Will some trees just not tolerate the process well enough to become a bonsai ? I have to believe some...

Vance, I understand that point of view. It still seems that if left to it's own devices, most bonsai would "prefer" to be larger, have more roots, and send branches all over the place. It's by our efforts that it retains the size and shape we want it to have. I suppose the goal is to keep it...

Vance, As a newbee trying to understand the basics and techniques, getting a tree to be in a bonsai state does seem to be a little of a balancing act. Maybe more than a little. There are a lot of things done to restrict the plant in one way or another. That's where I thought about the word...