Is San Gabriel Nursery getting out of bonsai?

Bonsai Nut

Nuttier than your average Nut
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For those of you in the Southern California market...

Was just at San Gabriel yesterday. Their bonsai product line continues to dwindle. I am aware that the break-in and theft a couple of years ago required them to build a security cage for their more expensive trees, but now they have moved all their bonsai material (including their cheapest stuff) into the cage area, effectively reducing the square footage they had dedicated to bonsai by 40%.

All of their bonsai starters are gone. The rows of nursery trays with the 3" pots of pines, junipers, elms - all gone. They used to have two full long tables of this material. One table they have converted to landscape azaleas. The other table they have removed completely and all that is left is an empty bed of gravel.

Very few pre-bonsai left. What was left was (in my opinion) ridiculously over-priced versus what they used to charge.

When we left the nursery, I went to point out the ancestral family home... and it is gone, the lot bulldozed flat. Even some of the back areas of the old greenhouses have been bulldozed. Has the nursery been sold to residential developers? Anyone close to the family know the scoop?
 

justBonsai

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For those of you in the Southern California market...

Was just at San Gabriel yesterday. Their bonsai product line continues to dwindle. I am aware that the break-in and theft a couple of years ago required them to build a security cage for their more expensive trees, but now they have moved all their bonsai material (including their cheapest stuff) into the cage area, effectively reducing the square footage they had dedicated to bonsai by 40%.

All of their bonsai starters are gone. The rows of nursery trays with the 3" pots of pines, junipers, elms - all gone. They used to have two full long tables of this material. One table they have converted to landscape azaleas. The other table they have removed completely and all that is left is an empty bed of gravel.

Very few pre-bonsai left. What was left was (in my opinion) ridiculously over-priced versus what they used to charge.

When we left the nursery, I went to point out the ancestral family home... and it is gone, the lot bulldozed flat. Even some of the back areas of the old greenhouses have been bulldozed. Has the nursery been sold to residential developers? Anyone close to the family know the scoop?
I just saw this post and have noticed over the past few months the quality in selection has been dwindling. They've already sold some of their grow areas where they kept a massive pre-bonsai stock. Mr. Ishii, one of the employees there let me look around the back area when I was searching for a specific cultivar in the past.

I also heard during bonsai-a-thon that they're down sizing their bonsai side of their nursery business as it hasn't been so profitable. The value of the land was just worth way more than the profit bonsai sales were generating.

It really saddens me to see this change. Every trip to San Gabriel Nursery was like going on a treasure hunt and boy have I gotten some treasures for a steal of a price. San Gabriel Nursery was my go to place and in my opinion the best nursery in Southern California to obtain pre-bonsai material.
 

BigBen

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Unfortunately, I've not had the pleasure of visiting this nursery, but it still saddens me to read this thread.
Hopefully they have something good planned for the nursery, and for Bonsai hobbyists.
 
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