Hey All,
So with some of my tax return money, I decided to make a couple serious pre-bonsai purchases online. This being one of them, 5 collected bald cypress which I intend on creating a forest / group planting with. Snagged them on Ebay this morning for a very reasonable price, these are the the eBay photos, they should be showing up on my doorstep by friday:
So I have a number of questions/topics I would like to get feedback on:
1. What is the best way for me to produce buttressing on these trees at this point?
2. Is it wise for me to plant these in separate containers to develop them, or to plant them together this season? Or, plant them in the ground... basically asking will ground growing produce buttressing faster?
3.One obvious challenge at this point is that all these trees are very close in height and width, which will need to change for a forest planting to work well. Right now I plan on chopping them at different heights, based on whatever slight trunk width differences there are right now. Then using sacrifice branches to increase width/taper on the trees that will be the taller ones in the planting. Any thoughts on Bald Cypress sacrifice branches?
In terms of styling, I am actually considering a more or less Flat-Top style. I find John Geanangel's flat top BC very inspiring and original. It seems one of the big issues with bald cypresses is growing out taper with a new leader, where the original chop can still be VERY visible. I think the the flat top style helps avoid this being such a possible eye sore. On a last note, I have 2 very small bald cypress saplings I will grow out for a while and incorporate into the design to create a 'grander' scale.
Thanks for any and all feedback/advice.
-Mike
So with some of my tax return money, I decided to make a couple serious pre-bonsai purchases online. This being one of them, 5 collected bald cypress which I intend on creating a forest / group planting with. Snagged them on Ebay this morning for a very reasonable price, these are the the eBay photos, they should be showing up on my doorstep by friday:
So I have a number of questions/topics I would like to get feedback on:
1. What is the best way for me to produce buttressing on these trees at this point?
2. Is it wise for me to plant these in separate containers to develop them, or to plant them together this season? Or, plant them in the ground... basically asking will ground growing produce buttressing faster?
3.One obvious challenge at this point is that all these trees are very close in height and width, which will need to change for a forest planting to work well. Right now I plan on chopping them at different heights, based on whatever slight trunk width differences there are right now. Then using sacrifice branches to increase width/taper on the trees that will be the taller ones in the planting. Any thoughts on Bald Cypress sacrifice branches?
In terms of styling, I am actually considering a more or less Flat-Top style. I find John Geanangel's flat top BC very inspiring and original. It seems one of the big issues with bald cypresses is growing out taper with a new leader, where the original chop can still be VERY visible. I think the the flat top style helps avoid this being such a possible eye sore. On a last note, I have 2 very small bald cypress saplings I will grow out for a while and incorporate into the design to create a 'grander' scale.
Thanks for any and all feedback/advice.
-Mike
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