Help on some Japanese maples

[Alain]

Hi there,
A friend of mine totally newbie in bonsai just ended up with more than 17 trees and is kind of lost.
She lives in the S of France so equivalent to zone 8 more or less, i.e. it's still warm there.
The trees she ended up with haven't been really well pruned/cut/styled, although they've got some really nice features.

I try to help her but I'm kind of jam.
She has to prune 3 Japanese maples but I don't really know what to tell her because they seem quite bushy to me.
What would you cut/do?

 

[sorce]

Seems like they were allowed to grow many clusters of branches after pruning. (First pic, right of big shadow)

I would go through and find all the keepers, size, short internodes , direction, and remove the rest.

Seems some branches go up, some down, if they cannot be redirected, chose one direction and remove others.

Looks like a situation of too much to work with.

I would only remove the definitely unnecessary, and give em another year to speak.

Could make for a nice group all together!

Sorce

 

[JudyB]

I think I would start work on the bases as soon as possible. If she has somewhere she can plant them out, and do ground layers with I would suggest that. These look like good candidates for chop and grow as shown in Peter Adams's Japanese Maple book. They are so straight, and the bases are -(trying to find a kind word for messy...) not really great, although the second one looks like a decent start. But if she is new to this, maybe she should learn just to keep them alive before doing anything drastic to them.

 

[Alain]

Thanks guys!

You are both right and no need to look for another word: they are messy!

She got then from her brother who moved and let her his trees so unfortunately I don't think she plan to do anything drastic about them.
If they were mine it will be chop/air layer/try to make something from the nebari and so on (and also put the maples and the Peruvian peppers in separated pots...)

All her 17 trees are basically as messy as these one...
I'll transmit your advice (which confirmed what I though but I wanted to be sure).

 

[Smoke]

In the three pictures above, the last tree is a trident. The first two are palmatums. Make sure that if used in a forest that each are denoted. I would denote them now with leaves with a tag or a number system on the pots with pain pen or similar. Palmatums need different treatment during pruning than tridents.

I would make decisions about pruning after leaf fall. They will not seem so bushy then. All the branching looks very small and not well developed. I think this will be a case for simple branch selection after leaf fall and then develop from there.

The bases are terrible and will not make attractive bonsai and will also need many years of work. Ground layer will allow one to start over.

 

[edprocoat]

Whats the little extra plant in the two trees you posted? Does it interfere with the roots system of the maples, it seems it might.

Edit; looking again it seems all three have an extra tree in the pot?

ed

 

[geoff hobson]

maples

I think with material that is good like these it would be better to try to find someone locally to help with the styling. It is not easy to say cut this or that especially with someone who does not know what they are doing. This could ruin the trees. I would suggest finding a club in the area and asking for help. We can't see all round them so we don't know where the best front is, and we can't see the root base,
Geoff.

 

[Alain]

Whats the little extra plant in the two trees you posted? Does it interfere with the roots system of the maples, it seems it might.

Edit; looking again it seems all three have an extra tree in the pot?

ed

they are peruvian peppers, I already told my friend it was may be not a good idea to mix trees like that. She will separate the apples from oranges next spring when she'll re-pot.

 

[dick benbow]

Great suggestions here. Most newbees tho might not have the skill or inclination to do what's necessary to begin the process of reclaimation.

It would be helpful if there was a mentor nearby to help get her started. If not maybe you could get the book mentioned that Mr Adams (RIP) penned on working with maples.

 

[Alain]

If not maybe you could get the book mentioned that Mr Adams (RIP) penned on working with maples.

Unfortunately I don't think she speaks English enough for this book, do you have any equivalent in French!