I am finally settled in to our new home in Phoenix Arizona. Getting my bonsai benches back up and going and have been driving some dirt roads looking at some of the Scrub Oaks. I was wondering what people look for when collecting oaks. Do you want them to already be loose in the soil? Rooted well and not moving much? I was collecting when living in Colorado and wad doing ok at it. I had help and was getting an idea of the best way and placed to look. So far here in Arizona its a lot of dirt digging with roots going out for a distance. Any tips anyone might have for collecting in arid environments I would appreciate.
I collect in the eastern side of the Sierra Nevadas near their southern limit where they turn into the tehachapi and transverse ranges. I found a very neat micro-region that has different geology and flora than the surrounding area. It has about 4 tree species that I count, all excellent for bonsai: singleleaf pinyon pine, California juniper, utah juniper (I suspect but havent confirmed that there are hybrids of the two species also)and tucker oak. Tucker oak is very similar to scrub oak but the leaves are small with a light green on one side and grey green on the other with prickly lobes on many. I have had much more luck with the junipers than the oaks, so I have recently been collecting some less desirable trees until I can improve success.
One thing I have noticed is that in general the small oak trees I have tried to collect have to be dug very deep before you begin to even see roots. The trunk extends below soil level. But look at the nuances in topography and sometimes the tree will be growing in a spot where water drains and creates a "shallow bowl". Sometimes I find trees with very dense rootballs growing in places like these. Its never going to look like a perfect example of what I just described and sometimes I didnt even realize this was the case until I began digging.
Another important aspect of the micro region is it is not exposed granite like almost everywhere else in the area. I have found so many awesome trees growing in cracks in granite and spent hours trying to extract them unsuccessfully. The trees are usually old and dwarfed because their trunk is squeezed so tight into granite it cant thicken any more, and very very rarely can be extracted. The place I found some weird whitish green and red sandstone that weathers into sand and pebbles. The digging isn't exactly easy , but it's always doable. The last 2 trips I've had 100% success with both species of juniper and also the single leaf pinyon, so I'm going to start going for the higher quality trees of these species I've scouted. The tucker oak I'm still not sure of but I will continue to try with them and experiment more with fall collecting. I have a couple pictures of trees from the area I'll attach( note some are way too big to collect but they ate just trees that I decided to photograph at the time. And the sun made the photos low quality)
