Amur maple forest

rockm

Spuds Moyogi
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Just fooling around with a new camera and software. Took this photo today--23 F snow...I leave this one out unprotected all winter. It doesn't care. It's hardy to Zone 3.
 

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plant_dr

Chumono
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What kind of camera did you get?
 

rockm

Spuds Moyogi
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Canon Powershot SX210 IS
 

mcpesq817

Omono
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Very nice - beats your earlier cell phone pics :D
 

plant_dr

Chumono
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The architectural design department(which I'm in) and graphic design students share the same computer lab here at school. I've heard great reviews of that camera from some of the graphic design people who deal with cameras, pictures and photoshop all day long; especially one girl I know who is a photographer. She said that she's gotten better pictures with that camera versus her big, expensive, fancy-shmancy one. Just watch out for the purple fringing like on the upper branches on your tree against the sky.

Take lots of pictures of your trees for us!
 

Smoke

Ignore-Amus
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Nice photo. Clear and the color temp looks good. Nice box of maples. Looks ready for a nice pot to me. Maybe this year?????


Maybe some of the scrolls? maybe.....one or two....sorry, I don't even beg my wife that hard.
 

Smoke

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I'd also like to know a little about that pot. Looks kinda square in shape, cool corners. Any history?
 

rockm

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The pot is Chinese about 18" by 12" or so. Not a real expensive one, but gets the job done. The "sword cut corners" are the reason I got it--that and it's quite shallow which work pretty well with forests. It hasn't spalled like other Chinese pots I've had. Seems to be quite frost resistant, as it's been left out in temps below 10 F for a few years. Can't remember where I got it, though--it was a while ago. The trees are about 15 years old, from pencil thin (and thinner) whips I got from Bill Valavanis.

I've got to repot this forest and another amur forest. These things break in growth in mid-Feb, so repotting them can be a challenge. Freezing your butt off with frozen soil in the snow is a drag.

I will try to get some photos of scrolls soon.
 

Brian Van Fleet

Pretty Fly for a Bonsai Guy
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Tasty composition...love the use of negative space on the left! How's the fall color?
 

rockm

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Fall color used to be great-reds and oranges. In the last few years, however, it's only been yellow. Can't quite figure it out. It's in full sun all spring and summer. I haven't gotten around to defoliating it though, so maybe that will be the ticket.

Amur maple is not an easy species to keep in bonsai shape. Tends ot die back hard at major pruning sites, only to put on an enormous amount of growth at the sites the following year--which can result in warty lumps on the trunks that don't go away--you can see that on these trunks. All those bumps were the sites of small limbs removed over 10 years ago... Ramification is not easy and all twigs tend towards straight and upward growth, making trees take on angular not-so-graceful shapes.

They are tough customers though. Most of these were bent over to the pot's surface under last year's 5 1/2 foot snow load. I didn't see them from Feb. until late March-until the snow melted and I could excavate them.
 
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ghues

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Hey Rockm,
Like others I like the composition and when I saw the “warty lumps on the trunks that don't go away” I liked it even more as it reminds me of walking in the deciduous trees/forests that we have here in the PNW. Our “big leaf maple Acer macrophyllum” grows large burls which are treasured by local artisans for their unusual and very interesting grain formations, many of them also have what they call “birds eye” effects which are stunning to look at.
Cheers Graham
 

rockm

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How is this Forest doing ?
Doing fine. Needs a hard cut back as it's getting leggy, but budded out too early (middle of Feb.) to get that done reliably. Was also going to move it from its current slab to a proper pot, but didn't get that done either. :rolleyes:
 
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