Late summer repotting

Forsoothe!

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If true then, one would be less likely to have wire bite in the Fall of a repot, correct?

This is good ACTUAL information to ponder.

Thanks!

Sorce
There is less bite in autumn wiring because there is very little wood movement at all until spring and since no sap is flowing there is less outward pressure, maybe even a sigh. Add to that lignifying for ~5 or 6 months, and you get good effects on woody plants. Maybe not as good as fixing the shape while actively growing, but there are always trade-offs.
 

Vance Wood

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I repot Pines, Hornbeam, Maples, Shimpaku, Spruce, and Hinoki Cypress in the summer and fall. I have been telling this forum this for years and get poo pooed for it so I stoped. Funny though; some of the biggest opponents of the concept now do it themselves. Want to know why Americans will never pass the Japanese in Bonsai? Because Americans refuse to step out on their own and experiment rather that accept every thing they have heard from some expert, teacher, sensi, or girl's gym instructor about bonsai. JMHO --- Don't listen to me, no one else does or will admit it.
 

leatherback

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Graham makes great videos, I don't know why he stoped other than there seems to be questions about his use of some of the music applied to his vids and I assume copy right issues.
that, and time. For a while he was flat-out just keeping up with orders and stock.
 

Forsoothe!

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I repot Pines, Hornbeam, Maples, Shimpaku, Spruce, and Hinoki Cypress in the summer and fall. I have been telling this forum this for years and get poo pooed for it so I stoped. Funny though; some of the biggest opponents of the concept now do it themselves. Want to know why Americans will never pass the Japanese in Bonsai? Because Americans refuse to step out on their own and experiment rather that accept every thing they have heard from some expert, teacher, sensi, or girl's gym instructor about bonsai. JMHO --- Don't listen to me, no one else does or will admit it.
How deep into fall?
 

smjmsy00

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that, and time. For a while he was flat-out just keeping up with orders and stock.
I wish he would mic himself a little better though and the reflection off of the background plastic made him look like some kind of illuminated gnome!
 

0soyoung

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My argument was meant to be that the tree may have to reduce the amount of fall wood it adds in order to repair and rebuild roots using it's limited amount of stored energy, if roots are reduced during a fall repot. I'm only speculating on that though
Yes, I've (so slowly) come to understand that. I will offer to you that in our tended pot culture it is not much, if any, effect. I've overdone root work in repotting that took an entire season for the trees to recover from. However, my instinct is that the roots recover in a couple of weeks of a properly done repot. I measured stem thicknesses of at least 8 trees of several species through the season. Week by week stem thicken more and more as spring progresses. Then shortly after the summer solstice this rate declines, week by week until cold dormancy sets in. Half of each species of tree was repotted in Aug/Sep and there was no significant disruption of the growth curve from the other trees that were repotted in spring. My repotting routine was to wash all the substrate out of the roots (done to weigh the young trees), invert the plastic nursery pots they were in, pruning the roots to the perimeter of the pot base, and then repotting the tree. The amount of root pruning is roughly equivalent to what I think to be normal practice with bonsai.

So, I don't think that what we do generally leads to the effects you were speculating, at least not to a significant degree.

I think everyone's concern about late summer or fall root pruning is that it may interfere with generating cold hardiness. This story from Brent Walston of evergreengardenworks.com is the icon for this.

We know from scientific literature that most of the water and mineral adsorption capacity comes from root hairs that are the extension of the walls of individual cell walls a few millimeters behind a growing root tip (as such, root hairs are not visible to the naked eye). These cells die after a few weeks, but are continually being replaced by a growing root. Being superficial cells full of water, they obviously would be killed by freezing to any degree. Even freezing of the root tip, like air pruning, would kill the tip, but would also trigger a new tip to be created 'up stream' as long as that older, competent root tissue wasn't killed by freezing as well.

So why does it matter when roots are pruned in late summer?
 

Forsoothe!

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Here's another two cents: The relative proportion of fine roots to total root mass in our potted trees is probably much higher than ordinary trees. Also, we favor keeping as many fine feeders as possible while pruning out anchor roots. The existing full canopy doesn't need any of the sugars (or, not much) to build new leaves. Already having a full canopy of leaves to process as much water and mineral content as the roots can supply as opposed to having only buds that need to be inflated before any surplus is sent back to the roots for rebuilding has to be another great advantage. That's 4 for 4!
 

Cable

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I repot Pines, Hornbeam, Maples, Shimpaku, Spruce, and Hinoki Cypress in the summer and fall.

Maples, eh? Even japanese? I have three red japanese maples (probably bloodgood) that are in 3 gallon pots that were given to me a few weeks ago. They are HEAVY and I assume were dug up and the pots are full of clay. I'd really like to repot them (as much for ease of carrying than anything else). I've worked on junipers and boxwood but I was scared to do jap maples because they seem to be so tempermental. Should I do it? Could I get away with a full bareroot? I do have the capability to keep in shade, water daily, and overwinter my maples in a root cellar anyway.
 

leatherback

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Maples, eh? Even japanese?

How about this.. Repotted in summer, chopped the big roots. PLaced a tourniquette. Then in spring I separated that and potted to have a green japanese maple next spring in its own pot. Mostly to see what would happen. Now I am kinda attached to the tree, it is a lot smaller, and I am working on getting the cuts to close.
tourniquette_roots_ap02-3.jpgtourniquette_roots_ap02-4.jpgtourniquette_roots_ap02-5.jpgtourniquette_roots_ap02-7.jpgtourniquette_roots_ap02-9.jpgtourniquette_roots_ap02-11.jpg
 

Cable

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How about this.. Repotted in summer, chopped the big roots. PLaced a tourniquette. Then in spring I separated that and potted to have a green japanese maple next spring in its own pot. Mostly to see what would happen. Now I am kinda attached to the tree, it is a lot smaller, and I am working on getting the cuts to close.

So what you're saying is, I'd be crazy NOT to?! lol. I'm gonna do it.
 

leatherback

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So what you're saying is, I'd be crazy NOT to?!
No, what I am saying is.. Make up your mind, and decide what you want to risk. I have found trees to respond very well to rootwork at this time, provided aftercare is proper. But then again, I think this is more than enough roots when layering..
 

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Maples, eh? Even japanese? I have three red japanese maples (probably bloodgood) that are in 3 gallon pots that were given to me a few weeks ago. They are HEAVY and I assume were dug up and the pots are full of clay. I'd really like to repot them (as much for ease of carrying than anything else). I've worked on junipers and boxwood but I was scared to do jap maples because they seem to be so tempermental. Should I do it? Could I get away with a full bareroot? I do have the capability to keep in shade, water daily, and overwinter my maples in a root cellar anyway.
What is your average temp there. Throw out the high and the low for a week and whats in between? For me it's about 99/100. This week is a cool down and the average will be 97, then back to the hundreds next week.
 

Maloghurst

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I repot Pines, Hornbeam, Maples, Shimpaku, Spruce, and Hinoki Cypress in the summer and fall. I have been telling this forum this for years and get poo pooed for it so I stoped. Funny though; some of the biggest opponents of the concept now do it themselves. Want to know why Americans will never pass the Japanese in Bonsai? Because Americans refuse to step out on their own and experiment rather that accept every thing they have heard from some expert, teacher, sensi, or girl's gym instructor about bonsai. JMHO --- Don't listen to me, no one else does or will admit it.
Hey Vance I just have a question about fall repotting maples. If you had to drastically root prune and bare root a trident. Would you still do it in August or wait till spring? I think this is the main problem people have with late summer repotting. It seems that others are saying to not do major root work. Seems that you can repot anytime if you only slightly reduce the roots.
I’m asking because I have two nursery tridents that need severe root work and my plan was to wait till spring. Here is a pic. This is the definition of rootbound!
E76D667C-6DD8-4027-96BF-52C21436DD26.jpeg432BFB77-6F9E-4457-A47F-60819E9ABCD7.jpegE6FE499C-AAD6-46B8-A54E-973EF072D241.jpeg
 

BobbyLane

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Hey Vance I just have a question about fall repotting maples. If you had to drastically root prune and bare root a trident. Would you still do it in August or wait till spring? I think this is the main problem people have with late summer repotting. It seems that others are saying to not do major root work. Seems that you can repot anytime if you only slightly reduce the roots.
I’m asking because I have two nursery tridents that need severe root work and my plan was to wait till spring. Here is a pic. This is the definition of rootbound!
View attachment 256812View attachment 256813View attachment 256815

what does the tree look like, is it in bad health? because if the tree is weak, youre going to be adding insult to injury. whether now or spring.
i wouldnt do severe root work on this. i would slice off a chunk off the base and tease out some of the surface roots. then a year down do some more. even when bare rooting trees in spring they can recover slowly, they recover quicker doing it how i said, from my own experience on nursery material.
 
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It seems that whenever @Walter Pall posts something explaining a technique, there are pages of vitriol that follow. Not sure why this is. I for one appreciate his input on this forum. I don't use all his techniques, but one can compare what he and other professionals do, and relate it to your own plants and environment. Perhaps it will work for you, perhaps not, but what's the harm in learning things from many different perspectives? This is my second year bare rooting in late summer. For me, in lower NY, late July through August has been a perfect time to bare root junipers, and I'm experimenting successfully (so far) with some deciduous species also thanks to some members here on Bnut. Let's just hear what the man has to say and try to take away something positive.
 

Saddler

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It seems that whenever @Walter Pall posts something explaining a technique, there are pages of vitriol that follow. Not sure why this is. I for one appreciate his input on this forum. I don't use all his techniques, but one can compare what he and other professionals do, and relate it to your own plants and environment. Perhaps it will work for you, perhaps not, but what's the harm in learning things from many different perspectives? This is my second year bare rooting in late summer. For me, in lower NY, late July through August has been a perfect time to bare root junipers, and I'm experimenting successfully (so far) with some deciduous species also thanks to some members here on Bnut. Let's just hear what the man has to say and try to take away something positive.
I think the vitriol promotes intelligent and useful information. It gets people to speak up with information that is both the positive and negative aspects of the topic at hand. Even someone telling about how something killed their tree swearing they will never do it again doesn’t stop me from doing it, it just makes me aware of a potential caveat. It also gives me a better feel for the people who are involved in the conversation, for better or worse.
 

Lazylightningny

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I think the vitriol promotes intelligent and useful information. It gets people to speak up with information that is both the positive and negative aspects of the topic at hand. Even someone telling about how something killed their tree swearing they will never do it again doesn’t stop me from doing it, it just makes me aware of a potential caveat. It also gives me a better feel for the people who are involved in the conversation, for better or worse.
VITRIOL

[ˈvitrēəl, ˈvitrēˌôl]

NOUN
  1. cruel and bitter criticism.
    "her mother's sudden gush of fury and vitriol"
    synonyms:
    revilement · invective · condemnation · castigation · chastisement ·
 

Saddler

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VITRIOL

[ˈvitrēəl, ˈvitrēˌôl]

NOUN
  1. cruel and bitter criticism.
    "her mother's sudden gush of fury and vitriol"
    synonyms:
    revilement · invective · condemnation · castigation · chastisement ·

Yea, I am aware of the meaning. I stand by what I said. When people go off the deep end, people respond. More often then not (here at least) with intelligent and useful information. When everyone is nice, people generally don’t want to step on the toes of anyone for fear of offending. When people have been offended, the truth comes out. It might not be the hand holding, PC, everyone feels so good way to learn, but it works none the less.
 
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