Melaleuca

[Bonsai Orange County]

I follow your Instagram account and really enjoy looking at your trees

 

[Ryceman3]

I follow your Instagram account and really enjoy looking at your trees

Glad you enjoy the trees and thanks for the follow!

 

[Ryceman3]

Repotted this tree last week. Very happy with the pot it is in, and even happier now I have it sitting much lower than the initial potting (see the “before” shot). It seems more settled, and the top continues to develop. I gave it a light trim today and removed a lot of wire. I’ll rewire in a few months to reset the silhouette but for now it can have a rest.

 

[Ryceman3]

Update on this tree. You can see how much it has pushed up since it was repotted in February!
I gave it a pretty conservative trim today as it is about to flower, so I‘ll wait for that to finish before doing a proper prune and wire most likely.

 

[Beanwagon]

Update on this tree. You can see how much it has pushed up since it was repotted in February!
I gave it a pretty conservative trim today as it is about to flower, so I‘ll wait for that to finish before doing a proper prune and wire most likely.


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Love it

 

[Ryceman3]

Update after a repot today…

 

[Colorado]

Really enjoy your posts about these Aussie native species!

It’s crazy how much it pushed itself up out of the pot!

GREAT looking tree!

 

[Shibui]

Make sure you understand that this is summer repotting.
Aussie natives and tropicals seem to thrive on root pruning through the growing season.

Increasingly, the question seems to be why do we repot temperate species 'before bud burst'

 

[Ryceman3]

Update on this tree.
It’s again pushed itself out of the pot so will need to have root work in a month or so, otherwise it’s very happy with life.
I gave it a trim yesterday to get the foliage back in order. I think it’s really starting to look how I imagined… the apex is lengthening as the foliage in that area extends, making it more proportional with the rest of the tree. Bonsai is never finished though!

 

[Maiden69]

It's crazy how much roots this tree develops in 1 year! Great progression, looking at the 2022 photos above, I think that your alternate front displays a better tree, but the actual front has a better nebari. Would a slight 3-5 degree rotation clockwise to the actual front make the tree look better?

This photo below but with the tree rotated 3-5 degrees clockwise. I don't have photoshop so I can't provide a virtual.

 

[Ryceman3]

It's crazy how much roots this tree develops in 1 year! Great progression, looking at the 2022 photos above, I think that your alternate front displays a better tree, but the actual front has a better nebari. Would a slight 3-5 degree rotation clockwise to the actual front make the tree look better?

Thanks for the reply, it certainly is a prolific grower.
I‘m happy it’s in a round pot, I often switch the direction it’s facing and have moments where I prefer one front over the others, but generally the front is pretty ”loose” … it changes on a regular basis. I’ll take a couple more pics at repot and update accordingly.

 

[Maiden69]

@Ryceman3 I don't know if it is posted, I looked and couldn't find it... what's the actual size of the tree?

 

[Ryceman3]

@Ryceman3 I don't know if it is posted, I looked and couldn't find it... what's the actual size of the tree?

@Maiden69 I'm not 100% certain, I haven't bothered to measure it for a while but I would estimate it at about 30cm (just under 12") from top of pot to apex and maybe just under 6cm (2.25") for trunk width at the base. Just an estimate though. I think the main (only?) drawback with the "alternate" front is it doesn't have as good a spread at the base from that angle.

 

[Ryceman3]

Just over 12 months on and another repot for this tree… as is it’s want.
Also a small trim back of the foliage a week or so ago. I’ll let it recover from here and then look to do a proper tidy up as we head into winter, at least it’s back to sitting down in the pot again!

 

[Bonsai Nut]

A truly awesome growth sequence!

Do not forget your nebari. It is the beginning, and at least traditionally, the most important part of any bonsai. You want to see a nice flare at the base of the trunk with radiating surface roots that give the tree its sense of stability and age. In every photo all I see is a trunkline that goes telephone pole straight down into the ground. The nebari may already be there, but just covered by the soil.

 

[gooeytek]

I love the progression pics, beautiful tree indeed.

 

[JRBonsai]

One of the greatest threads I've come across showing the refinement over the years and an artist who sticks stubbornly to his own vision (regarding the middle trunk). Bravo!

 

[Ryceman3]

A truly awesome growth sequence!

Do not forget your nebari. It is the beginning, and at least traditionally, the most important part of any bonsai. You want to see a nice flare at the base of the trunk with radiating surface roots that give the tree its sense of stability and age. In every photo all I see is a trunkline that goes telephone pole straight down into the ground. The nebari may already be there, but just covered by the soil.

Yeah, this is a pretty interesting species of Melaleuca. I have 2 others and they are all the same in that no really heavy roots seem to develop like generally happens with most trees, and that we would use in the creation of nebari. That's not the case with other Melaleuca I have though, just this kind (Melaleuca ericifolia). If you look back at the "root pad" image from the repot before this one you can see that the roots are all generally fine even up close to the trunk. Maybe next repot I might focus on paring back roots around the base from the top just to see if anything is there at all ... in any case the actual trunk continues to thicken at a decent rate, even in a small pot so I'm quite OK with it just sorting itself out right now. Thanks for the response, I appreciate it!