Getting Good at Bonsai

[one_bonsai]

Do you have to style hundreds of trees to get good at Bonsai?

 

[bonsaichile]

the name of the game us patience, little grasshopper

 

[0soyoung]

Do you have to style hundreds of trees to get good at Bonsai?

I think restyling the same tree hundreds of times might do it as well. .
But then you achieve perfection and the thing will grow and change anyway.

Just do it and keep trying. That is what I think this hobby is about. Enjoy the adventure.

 

[Walter Pall]

Do you have to run tens of thousand miles to be able to even finish a marathon in a reasonable time?
Do you have to play several hours EVERY day if you want to be reasonably good in playing a piano?

 

[leatherback]

No you do not. I see people a few months in getting great trees out of their hands with decent technique. Some people just have a feeling with the styling and handle plant naturally well.

Most people however butcher the first 1, 2, 500 trees they work on. Experience helps to get decent trees. But for some it comes naturally.

After styling etc comes refining, maintaining which I think everybody needs to learn through experience. But you can get that with 50 trees too

 

[one_bonsai]

No you do not. I see people a few months in getting great trees out of their hands with decent technique. Some people just have a feeling with the styling and handle plant naturally well.

Most people however butcher the first 1, 2, 500 trees they work on. Experience helps to get decent trees. But for some it comes naturally.

After styling etc comes refining, maintaining which I think everybody needs to learn through experience. But you can get that with 50 trees too

Thank you for a straight answer

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Depends on how you look at it. A reasonably unskilled person can water a very nice tree. Watering is 90% of the hobby I believe. If you can water, you're good at 90% of what it takes to keep bonsai trees.
Design wise, it might be a whole other thing. Some people have the eye for it, some have to forcefully develop an eye for it.
Then there's pot choices.. Then there's that given fact that some trees take years to die slowly.
I have a great imagination and an artistic background and I'm a skilled horticuluturist, but my trees are just starting to look like something after two years and it's going to take another 5-6 I'm sure. I own 15 species of pines but my jbp are doing terrible.
I can do a design in half an hour, 10 minutes sketching on paper, but getting the tree there is something that takes me years. Is that being good at bonsai? Is it being bad?
I don't know man. I see some people work with very expensive trees and taking them to the next level, but I also see beginners turning crap into diamonds. Which one of those is good, and who is better? Does it matter?

Do the results matter the most, or is it the journey?
I genuinely have no clue. I personally love trees that people have owned for decades, it shows dedication, skill and vision. But so does lifting an expensive established bonsai to the next level.

What is being bad at bonsai? And what is being good at it?

After some long and hard thinking, I think it all comes down to this: if you still enjoy the hobby/art after the first few seasons, you're good at it.

 

[VAFisher]

Do you have to run tens of thousand miles to be able to even finish a marathon in a reasonable time?

We talking Oprah time or Boston Marathon qualifying time? If the former, then no. If the latter...probably. Speaking from my own experience of course.

 

[choppychoppy]

Watering is 90% of the hobby I believe. If you can water, you're good at 90% of what it takes to keep bonsai trees

I use automatic watering always have, always will. I've never lost a tree from a watering issue. I have some pretty nice trees that I haven't physically watered in YEARS. Does this mean my irrigation setup is a 90% bonsai master lmao.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

I use automatic watering always have, always will. I've never lost a tree from a watering issue. I have some pretty nice trees that I haven't physically watered in YEARS. Does this mean my irrigation setup is a 90% bonsai master lmao.

You taught your system one thing, and it does that thing very well. You're a good teacher! Again, depending on the point of view ;-)
If you're happy and your trees are too, you're good in my book.

 

[just.wing.it]

It depends....

 

[MrWunderful]

IMO being “good” at bonsai starts with keeping trees alive, healthy and vigorous. Controlling pests and fungus as well.

Styling, grafting and other techniques is the the art side, that can only happen once you can keep big trees in little pots healthy.

 

[GGB]

I have very few trees, I'm just trying to have fun. I want to be very good and I'm fairly confident I'll get there. I'm only 6 years in. Some people are clearly hopeless and some clearly gifted. I think I'm definitely in the middle but time will tell. Unless you want to have multiple world class trees and give lectures, I don't think you need hundreds of trees. Pests and disease get out of hand when I start hoarding trees. But I'm banking on time/patience making me good. Maybe I'll never get there.
But I don't think your question has a "real" answer. too many variables

 

[Tieball]

About the time I think I’m getting “good” at bonsai....is usually when I make a huge error on a tree...then just step back and just shake my head in wonder....asking myself: What was I thinking? I knew that would probably happen. Hmmmmmmm....next tree....next volunteer.

I don’t have a lot of trees....less than 25. I have enough to keep me busy when I want to be kept busy. And, none of my trees are Bonsai trees yet.....the few I have are all in development and grow boxes. I enjoy the growing....and I know I make mistakes....and I know how to move on.

 

[Zach Smith]

Do you have to style hundreds of trees to get good at Bonsai?

Some good answers above. I'll add this: if you're talking about good in your own assessment, it might take one tree but more likely it'll take hundreds. If you're talking good objectively, meaning most astute observers think you're good, it's almost a sure bet it'll take hundreds. There are different levels of talent, obviously. I've known and taught individuals who became excellent bonsai artists through applied, sound technique over many, many years. I've also know individuals who probably won't ever get there, but they have trees they really love (nothing at all wrong with that). Since bonsai is a journey of constant learning, neither tree nor artist is ever complete. But do you really want to be?

 

[Bonsai Nut]

If you are learning on your own, it will take hundreds of trees, and you may actually never get better than an advanced beginner.

If you learn from someone else, and they are a good teacher and you are a good learner, you benefit hugely from their experience and will improve much more quickly, as well as likely arriving at a higher overall skill level.

 

[Smoke]

Do you have to style hundreds of trees to get good at Bonsai?

It depends on the definition of what "good" is.

 

[Adair M]

By whose definition of “good”?

Edited to add; it appears that Smoke and I posted the same comment simultaneously!

 

[Smoke]

good teacher good learner,

Doesn't that mean something in just about everything humans do??

I mean someone has to teach you how to wipe your ass.....but I know plenty of adults that can't do that properly either...

 

[Adair M]

Doesn't that mean something in just about everything humans do??

I mean someone has to teach you how to wipe your ass.....but I know plenty of adults that can't do that properly either...

Wow... you know a whole lot more about your friends than I do mine...