Looking to uppot and change soil for Fukien Tea bonsai!

[Deadwords12]

Hi- I have a young Fukien Tea that has started to outgrow its pot, with roots shooting out of the drainage holes. It's also in organic soil. It's in very good health, and has been flowering constantly for the past month or so. I want to move it from a 4 inch to a 6 inch pot, bu also change the soil from organic , to inorganic substrate. What would be the safest way to go about this? Would carefully washing away the organic soil hurt the plant?

 

[HorseloverFat]

Greetings from all slopes of the valley, traveler! The Tiny-Forest embraces you with gnarled branches!
Sorry that I missed your homing pigeon! My eyes aren’t what they used to be.

Tea trees, unfortunately, are not familiar to me. And their maintenance and care is not something I can confidently AND positively speak for.

Gotta seek out a tea-tree aficionado... and lasso ‘em.

But more seriously, someone with something meaningful to say should be along shortly with “the assist”..

Just saw you camped here... thought you could use some company.

Pleasure to make your acquaintance.

 

[lehigh4me]

Hi,
I have two Fukien Tea trees, the first one I bare rooted a couple of years ago. Put it in Napa 8822. I cut it back last winter because I wanted to get some budding down a little lower on the tree. Has been growing really well since the warmer weather hit here a few weeks ago.
The other one I just bare rooted and root pruned about 3 weeks ago and re-potted in Napa 8822. It is looking good so far. It has lost maybe a dozen leaves, but is doing well so far. I made sure I kept the roots wet and didn't let them dry out while i was working on it.

 

[Deadwords12]

Greetings from all slopes of the valley, traveler! The Tiny-Forest embraces you with gnarled branches!
Sorry that I missed your homing pigeon! My eyes aren’t what they used to be.

Tea trees, unfortunately, are not familiar to me. And their maintenance and care is not something I can confidently AND positively speak for.

Gotta seek out a tea-tree aficionado... and lasso ‘em.

But more seriously, someone with something meaningful to say should be along shortly with “the assist”..

Just saw you camped here... thought you could use some company.

Pleasure to make your acquaintance.

Thank you for your response!! it was a pleasure reading and cheered me up. I appreciate the company, and also the assist!!! The pleasure is all mine
All the best

 

[Deadwords12]

Hi,
I have two Fukien Tea trees, the first one I bare rooted a couple of years ago. Put it in Napa 8822. I cut it back last winter because I wanted to get some budding down a little lower on the tree. Has been growing really well since the warmer weather hit here a few weeks ago.
The other one I just bare rooted and root pruned about 3 weeks ago and re-potted in Napa 8822. It is looking good so far. It has lost maybe a dozen leaves, but is doing well so far. I made sure I kept the roots wet and didn't let them dry out while i was working on it.

Hi thank you for your response!! Do you recommend soaking the roots and soil in water first and then separating the roots from the soil? I don't want to hurt any roots as I want the best chance of survival , and styling is a lesser concern for now. I purchased 1/3 Hard Japanese Akadama - 1/3 Japanese Pumice - 1/3 USA Sourced Black Lava to repot the tree in.

 

[lehigh4me]

I just pretty much took mine out of the pot and dunked the roots in a bucket of water and cleaned the roots of that way. Root pruned and put in a different pot but dipping the roots in the water every couple of minutes just to keep them damp, because it was so hot here. I have never used Akadama so can't speak to that. I use Napa 8822 for pretty much every thing. It is easier find out here in Iowa where I live. Sometimes mixing it with pine bark or perlite.

 

[Deadwords12]

I just pretty much took mine out of the pot and dunked the roots in a bucket of water and cleaned the roots of that way. Root pruned and put in a different pot but dipping the roots in the water every couple of minutes just to keep them damp, because it was so hot here. I have never used Akadama so can't speak to that. I use Napa 8822 for pretty much every thing. It is easier find out here in Iowa where I live. Sometimes mixing it with pine bark or perlite.

Thank you!!! One last question. How should I expect my tree to react to this? will it drop a lot of leaves? did yours do that afterwards? I dont plan on trimming any roots as im increasing the size of the pot.

Once again thank you for your help

 

[Daniel_UK]

I have bare rooted a fukien from organic soil and repotted in an inorganic mixture, removing maybe a 1/3rd of the roots and some of the foliage and it didn't show any signs of growth for about 3 weeks and then is started growing again. You should be fine.

 

[HorseloverFat]

Lots of good information in this thread.. enough that I may direct other Fukien “answer seekers“ here.

Which is good.. cause I wouldn’t know Fukien care if it bit my nose off.

 

[Deadwords12]

I have bare rooted a fukien from organic soil and repotted in an inorganic mixture, removing maybe a 1/3rd of the roots and some of the foliage and it didn't show any signs of growth for about 3 weeks and then is started growing again. You should be fine.

Thank you so much!!!!! I really appreciate it! I can't wait to repot, all i'm waiting for is my soil in the mail. Do you have any other tips that would help? but seriously thank you so much.

 

[lehigh4me]

It might drop a few leaves but will be nothing to be concerned about. Enjoy your tree.

 

[Ollie]

Agree with what's been said here, you can bare root (carefully, preferably with a wooden chopstick) with no problem. Good chance it'll lose some leaves as they can be pretty fussy.

 

[Ollie]

Should add, if it struggles put a clear plastic bag over it and mist daily to increase the humidity. Let us know how it goes!

 

[Deadwords12]

Should add, if it struggles put a clear plastic bag over it and mist daily to increase the humidity. Let us know how it goes!

Will do!! thank you for helping!! I'll be sure to update you all!!

 

[SkyShep]

I have a Fukien tea that I repotted about a month ago because I discovered she was rootbound after having her only two weeks. I bare-rooted her, got the roots untangled, and cut the extremely long roots back but left the rest alone, keeping them moist all the while. I’ve read that you can cut back as much as 20% at a time but if you’re up-potting, that may not be necessary. I up-potted mine from a 6” pot to an 8” pot using a standard bonsai soil mix - it’s not overly coarse and holds water pretty well so she doesn’t need watering except every two days or so.

She has lost about half to two-thirds of her leaves in protest but looks like she’s perking back up. Mine is about 5-6 years old. I’m still very much a novice but I’ve learned a lot about teas with this whole forced re-potting business I put her through. Best of luck to you!

Edit: I forgot to add that I am misting once a day and she really likes that. I’m also fertilizing a little with a gentle 3-3-3 liquid fertilizer every couple of weeks. I’ve read conflicting information on whether or not to fertilize while the tree is recovering but doing about half the recommended amount has seemed to help.

 

[Deadwords12]

Hi All!
It's been a day since I've done the transplant , and have had good results so far!! I followed lehigh4me 's advice and continuously dunked the trees roots in water and carefully removed the organic matter in between the fine and larger roots. There was some inevitable root loss but I kept it at a minimum, and ended up with a relatively untouched root mass to work with! I took the roots and placed them in the new pot with inorganic soil, filled in between the roots by pushing the inorganic soil with a chop stick, like Ollie said. After the roots were covered I watered thoroughly. Since then she's been great!! seems to be responding well to my waterings afterward, as her soft tissue would perk up once watered well, which means the roots are doing their job! Special thank you to those mentioned as well as Daniel_UK , SkyShep, HorseloverFat !!!

 

[Ollie]

Nicely done!

 

[sorce]

Sorry I avoided this for selfish reasons.

Welcome to Crazy!

Sorce