First forests Dawn Redwood and Acer Palm.

[MorddexxBonsai]

I think it looks great. Super encouraging for a newby like me (who also has a Redwood Forest and plenty of JMs!) Do you know if your maples are Katsura Japanese Maples? The young leaves look similar and those are some of my favorites. Nice work and look forward to seeing the redwoods in that slab.

I'm still pretty much a noob myself this was put together the first year I started bonsai. The maples were labeled as plain Acer palmatum when I bought them but I do have a Katsura and it is a different color when it first leaves out. A little more yellow orange

 

[Bonsai Orange County]

Very nice. Look forward to keeping up with em! Makes sense about the Katsura’s I have a couple 1gallon Katsura’s with some young leaves still showing

 

[MorddexxBonsai]

Very nice. Look forward to keeping up with em! Makes sense about the Katsura’s I have a couple 1gallon Katsura’s with some young leaves still showing

Yeah that's how my Katsura looks as well. The one in my forest though are mostly red when they leaves first come out.

 

[MorddexxBonsai]

Winter update shots of the forests.

 

[PA_Penjing]

In the future, or at next repot, you could consider moving the trees closer together or adding trees between what you already have. The Redwoods might grow so much that it's not needed but I think the JM forest would be improved by more trees or a more crowded version of the original 5. Just my 2 cents, I do like them though.

 

[MorddexxBonsai]

In the future, or at next repot, you could consider moving the trees closer together or adding trees between what you already have. The Redwoods might grow so much that it's not needed but I think the JM forest would be improved by more trees or a more crowded version of the original 5. Just my 2 cents, I do like them though.

Yeah for sure on the maple I put it together when I first got interested in bonsai before I really learned much about placement in forests. They are also way to evenly spaced now that I know more.

 

[MorddexxBonsai]

Repotted the redwood forest onto a slab pot and trimmed the height of the trees.

 

[RKatzin]

This is very nice, but it definitely could be better. The very most important thing when laying out a forest is to identify your number one, two and three trees. These are usually your biggest, next biggest and third biggest tree.
The placement of these three trees is crucial to the development of the rest of the forest. Other trees can equal these, but none should be bigger.
Draw an imaginary cross in the container, centered length ways and front to back. Position number one tree to the left of center and either in front or back of the center. Position number two opposite of the number one, other side of pot and if number one is to the front then number two to the rear of center line. Number three is positioned as a support tree for number one, close, but opposite side of the center line.
Once you have these three trees positioned you can add in the rest of the trees around them keeping your smallest trees for the rear position.
I think you'll see a great improvement in your design and layout of your forests.