Guy_wires Collection

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Remember the root-over-rock red pine from post #73? It's still alive and kicking.

Rearranged it a little so that there's no root left in 20 years.

Since this one didn't skip a beat after repotting and actually is performing better ever since, I decided to start chewing bark and do a huge bend. A backbone of 4mm wire, a frontbone of 4mm wire wrapped in raffia, then a double 4mm wire to make it stick. Opened it up real good. Fresh air coming in and loads of sunlight. This is going to be a good year.

For my own reference, because I tend to keep track of the plants I hardly touch throughout the year:
Last week and this week:
- Rewired itoigawa whips, took tiny cuttings.
- Checked pre-winter juniper cuttings, they're not going to make it. Spring is better.
- Heavy bends on the scots pine norsk-typ. Backbudding on those is crazy! Awesome!
- Repotted the 1.5 euro mugo pine into a way too tiny pot. It's over or under with that one.
- Wired my first forestadori scots pine to it's pot. It's moving too much. Also added some more wiggle in the trunk.
- Treated some other collected trees with 6-bap to induce more budding, but I might have to do it again because it's not using much water. Plenty of frozen hormones in stock left.
- Repotted and wired the individual phoenicea junipers, new seeds are sprouting after being in the fridge for a couple of months.
- Took seedling cuttings from Ponderosa pines, because I fucking knew it: sow in a deep tray and you'll get deep roots, sow in a shallow (3cm) tray and you'll get a radical wicked sick flare. They also bud down low in a shallow tray because the first years growth is minimal. I kind of ruined the batch of ponderosa last year by sowing them in a 15cm deep tray. I got 10cm taproots with no adventitious roots running down to the bottom.
- Uppotted and wired ground grown red pines. Too late in the season, they were already extending. But hey, I have 100 more or so. Scots pines from seedling tray to the same type of potting mix as well, corrected the roots on those. Half and half bonsai soil and peat moss. Might do some good, might be a killer.
- I murdered 100 JBP because Japanese black pines suck! Sure, sure, 'king of bonsai'. If you can't survive in the ground, in fabric pots OR in plastic pots, then you don't belong in my kingdom, let alone rule it.
- Snapped my shohin cherry in half. Whoops! Three branches left. Also removed the dead piece of root.
- Juniper grafts, blaauw -> stricta and blaauw -> media/pfizer from the previous post. Documented a little over here: https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/nursery-juniper.42403/post-722418
- Potted up the chestnuts in the pot my mom made for them.
- Some backbone lower-trunk bend on the collected spruce bunjin. I didn't believe it could be done, but it wiggles now.
- Took my one and only ginkgo cutting and bent the crepe out of it.
- Uprooted the black walnut and made sure those bulges they make underground are above ground now. Instant taper!
- Completely wired (including wiring over the needles) two collected scots pines that are going to be awesome. I know, one should never wire over the needles. Why not? They keep functioning and they provide extra energy while they're dying. It doesn't look pretty, that's a fact. But then again, I'm not at that stage of wanting them pretty yet. They need bones first.
- Corrected the clump of scots pine seedlings, removed the Nigra seedling. Wired them with 0.5mm iron wire, it should either bite in and become invisible or oxidize completely within 2 years. I wonder how it influences the veins later on.
- Rewired the Communis juniper.
- Fertilized a whole lot.
- Repotted and rewired a 3 euro mugo. I might have too many cheap ones. Why don't they die?!
- Cut back some long branches on collected scots pines.
- Murdered roughly 70 thuja seedlings because they're not junipers and I'm a fool for trusting the Chinese sellers on Ebay. I kept the really nice ones, but I really couldn't care less about thuja.
- Repotted and rewired my already dead to be DAS.
- Sprayed for against aphids and scale last week.
- Dug up a spruce I took home last year, wired the crap out of it and put it in a container.
- Weeding, weeding, weeding. Lots of dandelions, you know, the cheetah is fasta dandelion. Lots of arabidopsis and at least a kilogram (that's as much as a liter) of pond plants which seeds seem to love finding bonsai pots.
- More weeding.
- Sifting old soils, I kind of want to get rid of my clay pellets and replace them with vulcastrat. That stuff is magic.

But, frosts are setting in again. At least, so I've heard. So I might end up with some extra space now. I could use it.
Thanks for reading! Feel free to ramp up a discussion. Public transport has been scaled down to the bare minimum, so I have loads of extra time to kill in the coming week.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Let's talk conifers.

Dug up red pines and some scots. I'd like to know how they do in sphagnum with some bonsai soil. Most of them have some wire on them.
Two or three years old.



Pinus halepensis respond great to decapitation. Now it's just waiting for adult foliage to form.


Longaeva year.. Three?


Cedrus (year two) and some leftover scots and a yellow JBP.


Some new spring growth on the phoenecian juniper, and a funky attempt to air layer.


Tiny two/three year old scots pines coming back to life. These were sown in shallow trays, root spread on them is wicked! But shallow trays don't support fast and tall growth, so they stayed tiny. This year, I'm allowing them to go bigger.

You see the yellow stuff? That's JBP!


P. strobus. Knocked the buds off in winter last year, with a cool result! But no backbudding whatsoever. So this year I'm trying spring.


Scots pine var. Norsk typ. Maybe my favorite cultivar of sylvestris, because it backbuds like crazy and as you can see it's pretty flexible. It also doesn't have the issue with thickening branches like the one below.


A grafted watereri cultivar of sylvestris. This one too buds readily, just cut a needle pair and you'll get a bud from that pair. The foliage on this type is awesome, real cool shade of blueish. But the branch thickening is a real issue; they start out at 3-4mm thickness and never stretch out. It's never going to be a good tree, but I like playing around with it. If you're wondering about the jin, yes, it's parallel to the trunk line. This is not the best front.


Wildtype sylvestris, took it home when people were going to clear an area in the woods. It was a tall and skinny one and I decided to cut it back to a stub after it was established in a pot. Now I have low branches to cut back to. Starting again from scratch, but since the roots supported a taller tree, I'm expecting this one to explode with growth this year.


Have a nice day today everyone!

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

2 years in a wooden box for this sylvestris.
The box fell apart last year, so I slapped some wire on it to keep it together for another. But since the bottom was also dropping out, I figured to just do a decent repot after two years. Nice root growth on this side, but also lots of dead stuff due to the crevasses in the wood - Yes, those boards were straight a couple of years ago. I removed almost no roots, with some shaking I was able to get most of the old woodland debris out. Another scots to go, in a similar box.

Compared to the roots I found in plastic pots, these look way better.

Scots pines seem to love the vulcastrat soil, and I love it too. It's not expensive and pretty much doesn't break down. I'm phasing out both akadama as well as the cat litter.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

This is why I like the forest floor. No tap root! Wide base! Scots pine!
Repot today after two years in a grow box. Most of the old forest soil fell right out with a light scratch. Mostly leaf litter compost.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

If there is no smaller tree in there, you graft one.
I did this juniper a couple weeks ago. Then we had our first winter frosts, now we're walking around in shorts.


I had some spare scots seedlings. Small chance they'll take but you need to practice at some point.


First oak leaves of the year!
English oak seems to be able to bud from anywhere, good to know since I chopped one down by more than half last winter. That one will be late, since it has just one bud. But it's right where I want it.


Elegant pond basket lady, JRP. Slapped some wire on and slipped the bark at the first turn. Oh well. I have plenty.


A young sprooz seedlink. High in vitamin C.


Ginkgo leafing out. I want to cut it back but I have no clue when to do so. Advice would be most welcome!

Cheers everyone!

 

[leatherback]

Busy bee!

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Kept tiny for two years, this clump to be finally got some bigger shoes. Buds down low and even on some of the fresh candles. Funky!

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Added another bench level today. All strapped in.


Candles taller than the trees themselves. The yellow are jbp, the rest is sylvestris.


Thuja sux! But they are rapid growers. Two or three years from seed, cut back every year.


Bark flakes on my tiny RJP. Three? Years from seed.


Foliage.


Wired this winter. I tried air layering without making a cut. Ground layering in the air? Anyhow, I thought they were too slow. So I ringed them and made some nice root cups.


Green fig.

That's it for today folks!

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Itoigawa going juvenile.


'black' pine on the left, halepensis on the right.


Errrting leafing out. Beeches in the back, some thuja, a grape, some scots pine


Trashcan ponderosa pines


Root over rocks in training. Some kind of larch.


A tiny ginkgo from cutting.


Last year of growing freely for this scots. Wired for function, not for aesthetics. I can't do aesthetic wiring yet. I know my limits.


Dwarf alberta spruce. Dug up five years ago and never really turned green until this year. Basic structure is OK for now.


Scots clump next to phoenicean juniper.


Have a nice day!

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Erectile dysfunction. Don't forget to water your pinus.


Also, on a more serious note.. I found some ants on a spruce. Signs of aphids. But the ants seemed to just be tickling dormant buds.

But those dormant buds weren't buds and they weren't dormant.

Scale. Underside of the younger nodes only.

Didn't know spruce was bothered by it. A new lesson today!

 

[just.wing.it]

Erectile dysfunction. Don't forget to water your pinus.
View attachment 301475

Also, on a more serious note.. I found some ants on a spruce. Signs of aphids. But the ants seemed to just be tickling dormant buds.
View attachment 301480
But those dormant buds weren't buds and they weren't dormant.
View attachment 301482
Scale. Underside of the younger nodes only.

Didn't know spruce was bothered by it. A new lesson today!

Think the scale was the issue for 5 years?

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Think the scale was the issue for 5 years?

This is a yamadori, I collected it in either 2018 or early 2019. I think the scale was there already and I mistook them for buds. I think it's a norway spruce.

The issue with my dwarf alberta spruce was me and me alone (and a couple of dry summers before that, but mostly me). I yanked those from the yard in winter, heavily reduced everything, jammed them into a bonsai pot with potting soil, forgot to water them more than fifteen times that summer. Repotted them again in freezing conditions into shallow trays two years ago. It's a miracle that they're still alive. It turns out they like water more than I expected!

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Seems I'm growing banana trees too!

Funny to see that our saw flies are discriminating; they only lay their eggs on European species.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Latest addition to the collection, all the way from the motherland.

This year I'm doing jack pine and rigida from seed.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Sudden loss of percolation. Found a fungal issue.

I love ceramic pots. My scots pines do too!
But root growth in cat litter and akadama just isn't as good as in vulcastrat.

Reference note:
Removed three dead pine grafts. Done two? Months ago.
Four were alive, the one with the sphagnum in the wrap had an extending candle, the other three were in poor health. So they got a nice tattoo cable sleeve plastic bag instead of parafilm, with some moss this time. Easier to get water in there and easier to work with in general compared to parafilm.

Going to do the same for the juniper tomorrow if I feel like it.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Another longeava bites the dust.


Common juniper


It's the filter. Explosion of growth!


Elongation started today.


Never repot mugo's in spring!


Tiny thuja from seed, wire is biting in.


Finally dropping the 3 year old needles.


Juniper sprouts.


Same, but different.


Strobus after a trim and after knocking all the buds off this spring. Minor back budding but not further back than 2 year old wood.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

Weird, Uploading issues.
Anyhow, a bowl a jacks. No stratification other than a few days in the fridge, just threw 'em on the ground a week ago.
Mix of pure masonry sand and a wee bit of potting soil. From most of the literature I found, that's what they like.

Jack pine seeds are super tiny.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

First ponderosa pine seedling cutting with roots.

The spring itoigawa cuttings show some swelling at the base too. That's roughly three months of waiting, for the people wondering. If all goes well, they should produce some roots this month.

 

[Wires_Guy_wires]

I don't remember cutting needles.


I don't remember sprinkling the candles with herbs.


I do remember finding bananas. Turns out they grow into these little salad muchers.

Fish food.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

Needle munchers, Kill 'em all.