Elm forest redone. Thoughts

[maroun.c]

Redid my Elm tree which had went from 5 to 3 trees in the last 3 years (2 trees didn't make it when I first potted them) the 2 new trees are the bigger ones in the front. One on the right that has multiple trunks matches the angle and the wind blown shape of the other trees in the back.
My intention for the straight trunk biggest tree was a tree that grew in the shade of big rocks to the left and grew straight but branches will be styled as windswept.
In the end I like the 3D effect and the different spacing of the trees but having second thoughts about the straight trunk ones.
Do u think I should take it out and replace with a tree that matches the style of the other ones?
Also have some.emptynspace where I can add couple smaller trees, do u think i should add a few more or just keep the dead space ?
Branches will be pruned in few months after the trees recover from repot.

 

[Forsoothe!]

You have a mixed metaphor here. All the trees in a forest grow up influenced by the same forces and therefore have a similar appearance. They can all lean left or right, or the outboard trees can lean outward if they appear to be pushed out by bigger trees of the interior. The trees in front can be smaller than the trees behind them if the view is a distance panorama. Or the reverse if the view is intended to be of standing very close to the forest where the trees in front are bigger and the trees in back are filling in the distance and preventing you from seeing the end of the forest. While you don't want all the trees to be too similar like a Weyerhaeuser timber tract, they shouldn't be too different, either. You can't have a stocky old Grandfather tree in the middle of a bunch of skinnier but taller trees, or a tall, straight group immediately adjacent to a group that is falling over. The brain sizes up a scene and expects the trees to display a continuity. If the Grandfather tree is some caliper, then the smaller trees need to be shorter than Gramps by the same proportion that they are thinner. Any trees that are too individualistic, especially as compared to the rest, will destroy the concept of "forest" or "group". You decide upon a species, a posture, a size, and last, but not least the spacing that completes the picture of a city park, a national forest, a tangled woods, a small clump or whatever you want the eye to interpret what it sees. To the same extent that 3 out of 4 people who see your planting exclaim, "Oh! Look at that, it's just like up north!", to that extent you are successful.

 

[sorce]

Aye.

I think Gramps can offer a couple smaller cuttings that would work well with the other trees.
But grams himself is too short and stocky.
Looks a good individual specimen, that deserves the honor of his own pot.

Had grams be taller then the others, I think this would be quite convincing.

Sorce

 

[maroun.c]

Thanks for the great explanation. Guess I came to that same conclusion only after I looked at them. Will find a tree to replace grandfather and to his own pot he goes!
Think i should add 2 other more trees to fill up the forest a bit more. Or would it make.it too cluttered?

 

[Forsoothe!]

Thanks for the great explanation. Guess I came to that same conclusion only after I looked at them. Will find a tree to replace grandfather and to his own pot he goes!
Think i should add 2 other more trees to fill up the forest a bit more. Or would it make.it too cluttered?

Forests should have too many trees to count with the eye. We can mentally count groups of pairs, and threes, and count by 2's when trees are arranged where it is easy to see the several pairs in a group repeated in a scene. That's the way the brain works and when trying to fool the brain into thinking this is a view of a "forest", it has to be difficult to count the trees. Positioning trees that way is a lot more difficult than it sounds. As part of the learning process cut a piece of paper the same footprint as the pot and use coins representing trees according to size using different size coins. Set the coins in patterns so that no trees line up in any direction. You will find that takes a lot more thinking than smart people would normally allow for such a "simple" act. You will find that you need to put them in groups of odd numbers with the groups "scattered". The eye can count five pretty easy by seeing a two and a three. Sevens are better, nines and above make most people count twice. Making an irregular path between groups such that a viewer has to moved their head to follow that path with their eye adds interest and also directs attention to something other than counting trees. Small pots usually hold clumps as opposed to forests with the trees very close together in one group.

Cluttered is a loaded word that insinuates disarray. If you have really crooked trees then you can assemble an "enchanted" forest, but such trees that actually fit together are like gold plated hen's teeth, hard to find. A forest is not cluttered by having too many trees, but can be if one or more trees doesn't look like it belongs. Like one that is bent when all others are straight, or one leans left and the rest lean right. In a real forest there are always some downed trees, it looks too out of scale in a pot. There are no rules that specify how many trees in a forest that makes sense other than too many to count quickly with the eye. Pot and pocketbook size matters, so take it from there.

 

[maroun.c]

Lost all the trees except for the thick straight one and one on the right side. Most probably repoting time or technique was to blame as I struggled with securing the trees and chopsticking soil well I guess. So sourced a few slanting trees and redid the forest making sure most trees share a common shape and are planted slating to the right and made sure to add tiny trees in the back which worked well in adding perspective I believe. Not sure if I should prune at this stage or let the trees recover from repotting first. Missed a tree so ended up chopping an s shaped tree and placed in the front, ill shape it similar to other trees as it grows. Any thoughts on overall shape l, trees placement.... shouldni remove the stones abd add more trees? It looks nicer in reality as pic doesn't really capture the 3D perspective

 

[Forsoothe!]

Start preliminary trimming for finished shape, but take it slow, choosing to remove crossing branches to give some consistency to the general direction that the branches grow. You can see that there are a lot of branches crossing in the center of the big oldest tree. They will only grow foliage on the ends so, generally speaking, they should all radiate outward from the trunk and not cross through the middle of the tree and emerge on the other side of the canopy. Ideally, you can look up, under the skirt of the canopy and see bare branches with foliage ramifying and growing at the ends of the branches which forms the canopy. Too many branches, especially crossing branches, are distracting and are confusing to the viewer. And they are not "natural". You want lots of crooked branches, but not criss-crossing. It's important to keep in mind that all branches need to look like they belong on the same tree. All the branches grow under they same conditions which do not change over time. A wind-blown tree has the strong wind blowing from the same side, forever. All the branches lean in the same direction to a greater or lesser extent. The same for non-wind-blown trees, all the branches experience the same growing conditions. They grow to the sun and where space allows, so like a broom, or flame, or Christmas tree, etc., with the lower branches longer because they are older, flatter (horizontal) because they are heavier, and with foliage further out because the interior is shaded. Successive upper layers are shorter because they are younger, and more upward pointing because they are lighter. The higher up in the tree, the thinner, lighter, and more erect they are with the tip-top short and straight up pointing at the sun. This is what you see when look up from bottom under the skirt of the canopy.

To the extent that you have more rugged, crooked branches, you have your fairy-tale enchanted forest, but it still has to look consistent. So you need to carefully and sloooowly pick and choose which to keep and which remove in favor of the ones you keep. It would be nice if the branches you keep would already then terminate at the canopy line, but that's unlikely in most cases because in a lot of cases you may keep two branches that are crossing each other and then you begin to grow each of them out towards their own side of the canopy, so they will be short of that canopy line. Wire can help in that case, but don't get carried away with thinking that you can correct them all. Sometimes the best you can get without breaking them is just a small change in direction. Take what comes easy and if you crack some put them back together and cover the crack with cut paste and put a ring of wire loosely around that joint so that two years from now when you see that branch is not quite where is should be you do not go back and crack it again because it will always be weak. And it will always be just a little short of where you wanted it.

I can't emphasize enough that you need to proceed slooowly picking and choosing, because you are stuck with your decisions, forever.