Giant Blue Atlas Cedar Literati In Training

october

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Hello All,

Part 1

I picked up this Cedar as rough nuresery stock over a year ago. Initially. It was a 3 feet tall or maybe a little more. It is a pretty old tree. Not ancient, but probably around 40-50 years old or so.

I have to say that when I first saw it, I thought that I had a clear cut plan for it. Although I was able to pull off my vision for it, I found it difficult to extract my vision from the picture I had drawn.

Pics 1 and 2: These are a pic at the nursery and then the pic after I brought it home. You can see how large it is by the comparison to the door.

Pic 3 is the tree root pruned and puit into its grow pot in which it will stay for 2-3 years. No styling work was done at this point.

Pic 4 and 5 are the tree after the first work. Although there is a huge difference. It was looking like a well manicured landscape tree. It was lacking that bonsai appearance. Some of the reasons for this were that the branches were too far apart. Also, that the branches were somewhat long and lacked some taper.
 

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october

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Part 2

Pic 6 and 7 is the tree all rewired and the apex brought down quite a bit. This will reduce the height of the tree and make it look more like bonsai proportions than landscape tree proportions.

Pic 8 is the beautifully rough, old base of the tree.

Pic 9 and 10 is how the tree looks now after 1 year of training. I was able to really swoop down the main branch and also fine wire the apex and get it in a good position. The tree is probably a little less than 2 1/2 feet now.

What will really help this tree is a lot of budding. A lot of new, tiny buds all over this tree will enhance its look as a full size tree. The old larger buds are part of the problem that makes it look a bit like a garden tree. However, the tree is pushing out an enormous amount of new buds. I am very hopeful about this tree’s future.

Any comments or has anyone else done any work with blue atlas cedar?

Rob
 

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pauldogx

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Looks like the beginning of a nice literati or Bunjin. The trunk has some nice movement and a bit of age to the bark.
Cool tree!!
 

october

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Thanks everyone..... I do have high hopes for this tree. Especially when it goes into its first bonsai pot either next year or the year after.

Rob
 

Brian Underwood

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Is this one still around? I imagine by now it is quite different. I would love to see some pictures!
 

Dan W.

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Same here. I'd love an update!
 

october

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Hello all,
Unfortunatley, The tree did not make it. The following season, I chopped a bit more off of the tree simply becasue it was more of a landscape tree than a bonsai. The branches had no taper, were far apart and a couple of other things. I think that the tree would never have made a good bonsai, if left as it was, but would have made a great landscape or patio tree. I learned the leasson that especially when dealing with blue atlas cedars, that it is extremely important to start with material that does not require any major chops.

Rob
 

JudyB

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Oh, that's too bad. But sometimes it's freeing to loose a tree that was never going to be great, and have more time for the potensai. (been there...)
 
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