awarrenj
Sapling
As a newbie, I have seen discussions of things like "how to thicken trunks", how to prune to direct energy, etc. Is there a text anywhere that explains all the ramifications of directing energy in a tree?
Learning Energy Fundamentals
- Thread starter awarrenj
- Start date
ShimpakuBonsai
Chumono
The resources section of this forum maybe a good start on many subjects.
See this link: https://www.bonsainut.com/resources/
See this link: https://www.bonsainut.com/resources/
MaciekA
Shohin
This is going to be a difficult thing to find any specific text on in bonsai terms, but in botany and the study of plants in general, the outcome of either pruning or not pruning (lengthening, leaving as sacrificial, etc) is seen through the lens of affecting energy demand, not directing energy. In other words it affects in a pull manner, not a push manner. The survivors of a pruning or needle plucking session are the ones that decide where stored energy goes by demanding it, and they also decide how much new energy is then diffused back into the tree by producing it. The energy we're talking about usually refers to sugars and starches. "Starch" being the long term energy cache and "sugar" being the short term and mobile form (note these are generic terms for more specific substances).
The above idea was covered well in a 2014 paper that showed that after pruning, the "signal" of energy demand arrives at responding buds faster than the hormone signal does -- in other words those dormant buds become aware of the pruning as a result of shifts in energy consumption than they do as a result of the changing hormone balance in the tree: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1322045111 .. Both sugar demand and hormone crosstalk determine how trees respond to pruning, which is why in bonsai we're preoccupied with both styling (wiring) and pruning to achieve our goals -- wiring affects both of these factors. Pruning affects both of these factors.
By about a million miles and a half, the person in bonsai who has talked about energy storage, energy demand, and hormone crosstalk in trees more than anyone else, probably more than the entire rest of the bonsai scene combined 10 times over, is Ryan Neil, not via the Mirai youtube channel but on the paid Mirai Live streaming service. Cancel your Netflix for a month or two, binge on Ryan's videos, and you'll be a walking encyclopedia in this topic pretty quickly and in a more bonsai-focused way than can be cobbled together from reading academic papers on PNAS. Aside from "the balance of water and oxygen", energy and hormones are very nearly the only other things he talks about, endlessly, in nearly every video on every species.
The above idea was covered well in a 2014 paper that showed that after pruning, the "signal" of energy demand arrives at responding buds faster than the hormone signal does -- in other words those dormant buds become aware of the pruning as a result of shifts in energy consumption than they do as a result of the changing hormone balance in the tree: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1322045111 .. Both sugar demand and hormone crosstalk determine how trees respond to pruning, which is why in bonsai we're preoccupied with both styling (wiring) and pruning to achieve our goals -- wiring affects both of these factors. Pruning affects both of these factors.
By about a million miles and a half, the person in bonsai who has talked about energy storage, energy demand, and hormone crosstalk in trees more than anyone else, probably more than the entire rest of the bonsai scene combined 10 times over, is Ryan Neil, not via the Mirai youtube channel but on the paid Mirai Live streaming service. Cancel your Netflix for a month or two, binge on Ryan's videos, and you'll be a walking encyclopedia in this topic pretty quickly and in a more bonsai-focused way than can be cobbled together from reading academic papers on PNAS. Aside from "the balance of water and oxygen", energy and hormones are very nearly the only other things he talks about, endlessly, in nearly every video on every species.
Glaucus
Chumono
Bonsai people just make things up on the fly. They do not know the actual state of knowledge. Neither do I. Thanks to @MaciekA for that excellent paper.
However, Ryan Neil, even with this horticulture background and pro-science attitude, has a lot of thing backwards as well. When people like him talk about things like 'energy balance' it mostly refers to a concept. Not to actual energy (ie sugars) in the plant.
Doesn't know their methods won't work.
I think very few people famous in bonsai read papers like this and figure out how it translates to bonsai. The resistance to Shigo on wound healing is a prime example. And what is happening right now with the soil microbiome, which does some from actual science, is a bit of a hype trying to sell products.
However, Ryan Neil, even with this horticulture background and pro-science attitude, has a lot of thing backwards as well. When people like him talk about things like 'energy balance' it mostly refers to a concept. Not to actual energy (ie sugars) in the plant.
Doesn't know their methods won't work.
I think very few people famous in bonsai read papers like this and figure out how it translates to bonsai. The resistance to Shigo on wound healing is a prime example. And what is happening right now with the soil microbiome, which does some from actual science, is a bit of a hype trying to sell products.
Last edited:
Kanorin
Omono
Thanks for this paper, I'm enjoying it. As a scientist, I can appreciate that this is a well-done study.
pandacular
Omono
I'm interested to hear more about this. I see a lot of weird attitudes towards wound healing. Shigo as in Dr. Alex Shigo?
Glaucus
Chumono
Just do a search and maybe add 'cut paste' on this very forum.
pandacular
Omono
Ah, you're just referring to sealing wounds with cut paste/putty. Yes, I do find the reluctance to that on this forum to be very odd! It seems like such an easy and straight-forward technique, and I don't see a downside to it really. That reminds me that I should pick up some deciduous cut putty; I've been using Kiyonal for even large cuts.
Glaucus
Chumono
Ah, you are trying to bait, haha.
awarrenj
Sapling
Thanks for all the replies. I guess I was looking for something a little simpler than "It is commonly accepted that the plant hormone auxin mediates apical dominance. However, we have discovered that apical dominance strongly correlates with sugar availability and not apically supplied auxin. " etc. from the paper.
I am not a scientist just a newbie trying to understand some of the statements I hear in the bonsai community.
I do appreciate the responses.
I am not a scientist just a newbie trying to understand some of the statements I hear in the bonsai community.
I do appreciate the responses.
kale
Shohin
Someone can correct me if I’m wrong, but how I’ve always interpreted it is spring and summer, energy is directed up to the foliage, and fall/winter it goes down to the roots. If you chop off a bunch of the plant as the buds are swollen in spring, all that energy was wasted. Cut off parts that the plant isnt using as much of any given time of year.
Deep Sea Diver
Masterpiece
That’s a good point. We are all searching for something simpler. I did. Learning can be hard work sometimes and grasping the concepts in bonsai requires time, observation and continuous improvement. We are all still learning here.
Regretfully plants are complex systems…and to add on to this, different plants sometimes act differently in similar situations.
Also even scientists don’t have a complete idea of what happens in the rhizosphere… which has a direct effect on a tree energy response.
The best thing as a beginning bonsai hobbyists, imho is to start simple, learn to keep all plants in the collection to be both healthy and robust… no mean feat as a beginner. But it’s a bonsai hobbyist’s number one priority.
While doing so, one learns the basic shifts in energy throughout the year. Which plants are apically dominant which basally domiinant and how this affects how we treat each species generally and specifically.
That should help you get started.
One of the best resources to assist beginners get started on this journey is free on YouTube. Go to Bonsai Mirai’s YouTube channel and study all the BSOP offerings posted there.
The paid BM offerings that @MaciekA mentioned expand on this base knowledge.
Finally there is allot of knowledge posted in these threads. Use the search engine to help locate items of interest.
Cheers
DSD sends
Regretfully plants are complex systems…and to add on to this, different plants sometimes act differently in similar situations.
Also even scientists don’t have a complete idea of what happens in the rhizosphere… which has a direct effect on a tree energy response.
The best thing as a beginning bonsai hobbyists, imho is to start simple, learn to keep all plants in the collection to be both healthy and robust… no mean feat as a beginner. But it’s a bonsai hobbyist’s number one priority.
While doing so, one learns the basic shifts in energy throughout the year. Which plants are apically dominant which basally domiinant and how this affects how we treat each species generally and specifically.
That should help you get started.
One of the best resources to assist beginners get started on this journey is free on YouTube. Go to Bonsai Mirai’s YouTube channel and study all the BSOP offerings posted there.
The paid BM offerings that @MaciekA mentioned expand on this base knowledge.
Finally there is allot of knowledge posted in these threads. Use the search engine to help locate items of interest.
Cheers
DSD sends
MaciekA
Shohin
Apologies @awarrenj , I hit you with a wall of technobabble. The babble can be useful and enjoyable in reasoning about trees, especially if no tradition or source or rote technique-learning exists, but in any case, there is also another way to look at all of this, to play my own devil's advocate ...
Last year, I spent a day working on pines with Jonas Dupuich when he visited Left Coast Bonsai to marathon our way through a bunch of material. I talked to him about exactly this topic, i.e:
How do we explain and reason about what trees are doing and how they will respond, if not through a wall of hardcore botanical knowledge? How can we even avoid talking about sugar and hormones and moisture/air content in the soil and so on to make good trees?
His answer -- which I greatly respect specifically because Jonas makes beautiful bonsai and also teaches bonsai exceptionally well -- was to observe people who make great bonsai and learn from their practical tangible experiences. Watch and repeat what they do instead of mediating everything through a theoretical translation layer.
Jonas observes that most people he met in Japan making outstanding bonsai weren't talking about auxin and the workings of photosynthesis, they were instead working on trees as they were trained to do, and teaching each other by doing & showing.
The technical nerds do exist, but artists like Daisaku Nomoto don't explain (say) pine bonsai in hardcore botany terms. They instead show examples and say "if you do this, then you should expect such-and-such outcome". This was my experience with Daisaku's advice at Shohin School where every attendee got a quick 1 minute one-on-one for advice. He said (in Japanese) "cut here, remove these shoots and needles over here, and you will get shoots here and here". I did those things, and got exactly the response that he predicted. It was not explained in botanical terms. I didn't even actually understand what he was saying and needed a translator, but his body and hand motions spoke volumes, and an experience like that is easy to remember thereafter.
Some teachers don't say much at all, and your goal as a student has to be to watch and observe and work it out. In those circles, bonsai is sometimes seen as a craft, a trade that can be learned rote. If true for any species, it's most true for black pine, where rote application of trained actions with your body/hands (as opposed with your academia-driven galaxy brain) produce some truly amazing results, even amongst amateurs. I study with Michael Hagedorn, and he is an advocate of this watch-and-learn approach. Watch what the teacher does with their hands and body, and pay attention to context. Do we talk botany? A little bit, but not much. This topic can be taught in terms of craft and art and plain-worded stated expectations about what will happen as a result of actions.
I dive into the technobabble because it is intellectually satisfying to go and back-trace how this all might work, or how to generalize rote techniques to a wider range of non-traditional species.
I do believe that some will derive value from reading scientific papers (or watching Ryan's lectures) and that it will help them mentally model what's going on enough to at least stop themselves from doing outright-wrong things with trees (eg: beginners justifying a fatal mistake through flawed quasi-scientific reasoning), if not necessarily create great bonsai. But knowing about auxin and sugar doesn't tell you much about how to arrange a beautiful canopy even if you can recite Ryan's lectures.
Unfortunately, these experiences have pushed me towards a "bonsai is learned directly through other people" position, which is a really unsatisfying answer for someone who wants to understand what we say when we mean "direct energy" and so on and just wants simple answers to what that means.
The thing is though, you can learn bonsai in an extremely craft-oriented, non-technical, watch-and-repeat way, but the majority of beginners do not have access to that kind of in-person watch-me-do-then-you-try resource. And for people like me and others who study these things, a question that includes the words "directing energy" is difficult to answer without resorting to scientific reasoning, because non-scientific notions of energy lead to incoherent understanding.
Jonas would probably suggest that the student ask "how do I get that result I see in that tree over there?" or "how can I get this branch to have more sub-branches?" or "can I make this trunk thicker?" or "how can I stop my pines from having yellow needles?" and other more directly-tangible aesthetic-goal-oriented questions to avoid slipping into theory land. I am drowning in theory and have the t-shirt (edit: I literally have a "balance of water and oxygen" t-shirt), but I will be the first to say theory is easily the slowest way to become as good as Daisaku at black pine.
"Forget energy, watch your teacher's hands".. ? Maybe. I'm admittedly still a little torn, and will probably keep reading papers.
Anyway, this thread is has "energy fundamentals" in the title, and it's hard for someone who has seen many Ryan lectures to see the answer to that question not stated in a technical way. But answering the question might not necessarily be critical for getting good at bonsai.
Last year, I spent a day working on pines with Jonas Dupuich when he visited Left Coast Bonsai to marathon our way through a bunch of material. I talked to him about exactly this topic, i.e:
How do we explain and reason about what trees are doing and how they will respond, if not through a wall of hardcore botanical knowledge? How can we even avoid talking about sugar and hormones and moisture/air content in the soil and so on to make good trees?
His answer -- which I greatly respect specifically because Jonas makes beautiful bonsai and also teaches bonsai exceptionally well -- was to observe people who make great bonsai and learn from their practical tangible experiences. Watch and repeat what they do instead of mediating everything through a theoretical translation layer.
Jonas observes that most people he met in Japan making outstanding bonsai weren't talking about auxin and the workings of photosynthesis, they were instead working on trees as they were trained to do, and teaching each other by doing & showing.
The technical nerds do exist, but artists like Daisaku Nomoto don't explain (say) pine bonsai in hardcore botany terms. They instead show examples and say "if you do this, then you should expect such-and-such outcome". This was my experience with Daisaku's advice at Shohin School where every attendee got a quick 1 minute one-on-one for advice. He said (in Japanese) "cut here, remove these shoots and needles over here, and you will get shoots here and here". I did those things, and got exactly the response that he predicted. It was not explained in botanical terms. I didn't even actually understand what he was saying and needed a translator, but his body and hand motions spoke volumes, and an experience like that is easy to remember thereafter.
Some teachers don't say much at all, and your goal as a student has to be to watch and observe and work it out. In those circles, bonsai is sometimes seen as a craft, a trade that can be learned rote. If true for any species, it's most true for black pine, where rote application of trained actions with your body/hands (as opposed with your academia-driven galaxy brain) produce some truly amazing results, even amongst amateurs. I study with Michael Hagedorn, and he is an advocate of this watch-and-learn approach. Watch what the teacher does with their hands and body, and pay attention to context. Do we talk botany? A little bit, but not much. This topic can be taught in terms of craft and art and plain-worded stated expectations about what will happen as a result of actions.
I dive into the technobabble because it is intellectually satisfying to go and back-trace how this all might work, or how to generalize rote techniques to a wider range of non-traditional species.
I do believe that some will derive value from reading scientific papers (or watching Ryan's lectures) and that it will help them mentally model what's going on enough to at least stop themselves from doing outright-wrong things with trees (eg: beginners justifying a fatal mistake through flawed quasi-scientific reasoning), if not necessarily create great bonsai. But knowing about auxin and sugar doesn't tell you much about how to arrange a beautiful canopy even if you can recite Ryan's lectures.
Unfortunately, these experiences have pushed me towards a "bonsai is learned directly through other people" position, which is a really unsatisfying answer for someone who wants to understand what we say when we mean "direct energy" and so on and just wants simple answers to what that means.
The thing is though, you can learn bonsai in an extremely craft-oriented, non-technical, watch-and-repeat way, but the majority of beginners do not have access to that kind of in-person watch-me-do-then-you-try resource. And for people like me and others who study these things, a question that includes the words "directing energy" is difficult to answer without resorting to scientific reasoning, because non-scientific notions of energy lead to incoherent understanding.
Jonas would probably suggest that the student ask "how do I get that result I see in that tree over there?" or "how can I get this branch to have more sub-branches?" or "can I make this trunk thicker?" or "how can I stop my pines from having yellow needles?" and other more directly-tangible aesthetic-goal-oriented questions to avoid slipping into theory land. I am drowning in theory and have the t-shirt (edit: I literally have a "balance of water and oxygen" t-shirt), but I will be the first to say theory is easily the slowest way to become as good as Daisaku at black pine.
"Forget energy, watch your teacher's hands".. ? Maybe. I'm admittedly still a little torn, and will probably keep reading papers.
Anyway, this thread is has "energy fundamentals" in the title, and it's hard for someone who has seen many Ryan lectures to see the answer to that question not stated in a technical way. But answering the question might not necessarily be critical for getting good at bonsai.
Last edited:
Glaucus
Chumono
The abstract says that it is sugars trigger budbreak. And that pruning out the growing tip removes a demand for sugar in the apex. Which frees up the sugars for dormant basal buds. Which will then start to grow.
Which also means that most of the energy the plant is producing everywhere is being transported to the growing tips.
The point is that your very logical desire for a textbook or a primer explaining things like 'energy balance for bonsai' is not going to be satisfied. Bonsai people develop their methods through trial and error. Then they try to explain or put into words and concepts what they are doing. Often, this borrows terms from science. The auxin example is a good one. But it is not based on a scientifically founded shared knowledge. When Ryan Neil talks about 'energy balance', you need to understand how he uses this term. And not so much what you think it would mean scientifically.
Other people will use the same terms, but mean something different.
Eventually, people will start to use more of the same terms and more correct science. If you phrase a more pointed question, people will be able to answer that question specifically.
Wulfskaar
Omono
In one of his Bonsai Zone videos from maybe a couple years ago, @Nigel Saunders explained the energy/vigor movement in a way that I easily understood, but I have not been able to find the same video again as a reference.
He explained it's "movement" for a whole year in very simple terms without all the scientific details. I really wish I could find it!
He explained it's "movement" for a whole year in very simple terms without all the scientific details. I really wish I could find it!
awarrenj
Sapling
Thanks again for your advice. I am fortunate to have a bonsai group with several senior members who are willing to share their knowledge and experience.
The suggestion to be patient is well taken; I told my wife the other day maybe , as a newbie, I should concentrate now on just keeping them alive and healthy.
Your suggestions give me added confidence that over time it will come.
Thanks
The suggestion to be patient is well taken; I told my wife the other day maybe , as a newbie, I should concentrate now on just keeping them alive and healthy.
Your suggestions give me added confidence that over time it will come.
Thanks
pandacular
Omono
Meanwhile, my girlfriend is consistently telling me the same! Focusing on health is good, especially when you don't have a design in mind, but I think it's a bit of a fallacy that not applying technique is better for a trees health. Knowing when, where, and how to prune can give you a healthier tree than just letting it sit on the bench.
awarrenj
Sapling
Thanks for your reference to Nigel Saunders; while I didn't find the energy video I found videos where he is pruning and talking about not only style but energy reasons for his pruning. very helpful, thanks for thr reference
Kadebe
Chumono
Start first on the free YouTube channel... the BSOP series
FreshAirSunshine
Shohin
Yeah there’s a lot of pseudoscience in bonsai and also probably some observed behaviors science hasn’t properly described or attached a mechanism to. Observations from the artists go hand-in-hand with the science. The science often is not directed towards bonsai as well, but rather agriculture or true botany. I would just keep in mind when you’re receiving science guidance from a bonsai artist or translating bonsai guidance from a scientific source that they may not map directly. Grains of salt taken for each outside their area of expertise. As an example, Ryan Neil’s discussion of soil in a few videos has a potassium/sodium to calcium ratio of “4” in akadama when the former is a +1 ion and the latter is +2 so it should be 2. He also likes talking about cation exchange capacity but that will vary depending on the aluminum to silicon contents of the material (so different sources would be different there). Same when people add “zeolite” as a component to their soil - there’s like 170 made zeolites - is it sodalite? Faujasite? - Linde A? Linde Y? We have a habit of skimming the top of the science which can lead to incomplete info and bad understanding.
Similar threads
