Disqualified contest candidate ficus retusa

reg-i

Sapling
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To start off I live down in sunny,humid,ficus heaven South Florida. So I came across this contest through stone lantern/bonsai bark the contest was for a bonsai from scratch it had to be a fresh made bonsai from nursery stock ext...Anyway I took all these pictures and I got disqualified for my tree looking like it had previously been worked on its not uncommon to find well developed ficus's at some of these older nursery's. Well it would be a shame to wast all that time and effort in photographing the stages it went through so far, so I thought I would resize all the pictures wich took some time and share them with my new B-Nut friends also I just started a very nice willow leaf ficus forest that I want to share with you guys once I get some growth out of it.

When I just tried to post this I had 43 images it would only let me use 12 sorry

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Smoke

Ignore-Amus
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The guy that disqualified your tree was probably a person that had never ever made a "real" bonsai in his life. Since that person could not a good bonsai from a bad one it is easy to see why this was disqualified. This probably seemed finished to that person and so therefore could not be entered.

that being said.... I think you have gone a long ways in trying to improve your piece of material. Unfortunatly, some of the greatist attributes about ficus trees has been removed in an effort to make it somehow conform to a more Japanese model.

Treat yourself to the many pictures of great trees from the countries of Indonesia and Viet Nam. (google "indonesian bonsai") Once you see how great ficus look, you can begin to add those flavors back to your tree and really help it capture the feeling of a tremendously old ficus tree near some old temple.

Good luck, Al
 
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I like the tree and think you have some awesome potential there... I like where you are going with it, as a matter of personal taste, I would agree with Smoke on styling in a more natural look of a banyan tree, but to each his own... reguardless, it is going to be a very nice tree!!!
nice find...
 

reg-i

Sapling
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Like I said the tree is not finished yet I didnt like the placement of the stuff I removed ficus grow very fast here I have a wood table I made out of pallets my dogs go under there and dig in the sand all the time so theres alot of humidity rising from there I get amazing growth out of ficus there

I made this root over rock in one season, I pulled this little tree out of my neighbors gutter at the beginning of spring and wrapped the roots around a rock and pack with lose soil then wrapped an old shirt around it
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this is her mother in front of my house
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Klytus

Omono
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Odd isn't it that a fig with a strange handle like root was already worked upon,i don't know about you but does Penjingist utilitarianism qualify as previously occuring Bonsai work?
 

Klytus

Omono
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The use of pre-existing features,in this case the jug handle would prove useful in preventing rough handling of the trunk.

I'm glad your offering was rejected as seeing the fruits of your labours reminded me it was time to sort out my own fig.

Whilst revolving it prior to reduction of one side i was surprised to find these green 'berries' hanging onto a single branch,it was slightly awesome.
 

adamc

Seed
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Klytus,

wtf? i feel dumber after reading your comment.
 
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