Five Year Native Tree Challenge - Woocash’s Field Maple

[Woocash]

Ok, since this contest started I have always intended to actually enter and document some progress, but what with the arrival of a newborn and subsequent kick up the backside to get the boat nearer completion I have had very little time to do any work on any trees, let alone document and post about them. There are a few I had earmarked for the challenge, however, so I have finally gotten round to doing a bit of work and posting them.

First, a tree that will quite possibly stay with me for as long as I am around on this spinning ball of rock. After some workmen had cleared a load of scrubland on the site - and rather injudiciously at that, I chanced upon this maple at the back end of last year, right on the edge of where they had been clearing. Tucked away in a dense thicket of blackthorn, I would likely have never spotted it so thank you workmen (and girlfriend for employing them).

It has been rabbit/deer munched all around the base and up into the crown so while only 15 or so years old it has the look of centuries worth of age to it. Plus, to my eye at least, it has nearly perfect branch structure already. I merely need to add some flesh to the bones…



Collected 24th February. Conveniently, it was growing in a thin organic layer on top of a layer of heavy clay meaning it has a nice even root spread with almost no downward roots. It is quite big, however, so getting out of the hole and lumping it to the van was no mean feat!


It required a big box so I thought an octagonal one would do nicely



These pictures show the nice root spread but they will need some reduction in the future



Finally, potted up and ready to go!

 

[Woocash]

After a long, cold, wet beginning to spring it was only beginning to leaf out at the start of may.



Then, for the next month, it really struggled with and giant infestation of green fly. I am loathed to use too many chemicals, but after a good treatment of bug spray, the effect was almost instantaneous and by the beginning of July it had exploded with growth. At that point I decided to give it a haircut.



I had initially decided to employ the hedging technique, but because the growth was so dense and because so much of it was useless, I went for a more selective approach so I can see the branch structure more clearly and the future direction is easier to manage. I am using hedging for several of my trees and it appears to be working well, but for field maple the growth is just so coarse and budding so prolific that there will always be options available and so back budding just doesn’t need to be encouraged in the same way.

As it stands today, 70cm (28”) tall from the pot, 60cm wide, 10cm (4”) trunk thickness at 10cm high.

 

[Perrywinkle]

Wow it’s already on its way to being an impressive bonsai. Good luck

 

[Divide_by_zero]

View attachment 387382

Drool, that root base! I would kill for a chance at material like that. Great job collecting this beast!

 

[Woocash]

The last couple of years have pretty much been at a standstill bonsai wise for me. All I've managed to get done is rig up a watering system to make sure they stayed alive, but now this year I'm finally able to get working on my trees again.

Earlier this year I gave this maple a good prune and it looks ok for a starting point, but one of the important branches on the left side crown never woke up after collecting and has left a glaring hole that has been bothering me since then.

I've also been toying with the idea of removing one large branch that sticks out directly from the front, so that's given me an idea...


I've taken a field maple sapling and drilled a hole through the offending limb, wrapped the sapling in cling film to protect the buds as much as possible then stuffed it through the hole.

The plan is for it to grow in to the branch then to lop it off when a decent union has been forged and attempt to graft it just above the base of the left hand trunk. If it works, great. If not, not the end of the world. The limb needs to come off anyway and if it fails to reattach I'll cross that bridge and thread graft or something.