New to me ROR Cotoneaster..

[johnbaz]

Hi all

I went to the Bonsai Bootsale yesterday and brought four trees home with me..

This li'l Cotoneaster was £30, My pic makes it look rubbish!!, It's nice in reality but will need to get some more foliage next year so feeding will be heavy!!

Cheers, John

 

[AlainK]

I find it a bit expensive, but cotos are fun to work with.

The first thing I would do with this one would be to wrap it more tightly to the stone. There are also two opposed branches, I would get rid of the one that is against the stone, on the right...

 

[Shibui]

Cotoneaster respond really well to bonsai techniques so you should end up with a good bonsai.
There is some effort in finding the rock and getting the tree adapted to it so I would not begrudge the price.
Not sure cotoneaster are particularly suited to ROR because roots do not thicken quickly so will take many years to become a feature. Maybe just grow it as a cotoneaster with a rock rather than emphasize ROR. Just my 2c

Pity that outside branch is so thick. It would look far better if it was a little thinner than the trunk but that's how these grow.

Heavy feeding and pruning as often as you can will see the branch pads bulk up quickly.