Riverboat Bonsai

Woocash

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I have thought about creating a thread here to document overall work done for a while, but I on Sunday something happened to prompt me to do it. Nothing big, but something I wanted to share, the results of which last night really made me happy. In this thread I hope to post a mixture of bonsai updates, new additions, work, stylings etc along with some sort of progress reports of work I’ve managed to get done on my dutch barge restoration, which I know some people have expressed an interest in.

So, first off. I currently live on a narrowboat on the River Thames with my girlfriend and two dogs. We occupy a living space of approximately 11m x 2m (36ft x 6ft). We try and stay on top of the mess as best we can, but living alongside a river in such a small space, mess accumulates pretty quickly, much quicker than in a house. No one wants to engage in cleaning as a hobby so quite often the question arises of what I plan on doing on a given Sunday. I reply that I plan on taking the dogs on a nice long walk, then my girlfriend kicks me and the other mess makers out and she gives the boat a good once over. Shame.

This Sunday we took a trip to a local woods that the dogs and I love. It is a man made plantation with a mixture of hundred year old beeches, ash, hazel and hawthorn interspersed with individual mature oaks and 50 year old Sycamore, European larch, Norway spruce and Scots pine plantations. There is an ancient Field maple hedge Forming a boundary. So lots of variation in 87 acres.

Old Maples on the fringes
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Couple of rarely seen multi trunked english oaks
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Bright pink undersides of sycamore leaves in a glade
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Scots Pine (bad angle) and a well used photo opportunity hazel
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Woocash

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For some reason I forgot to take many pictures of potential bonsai that I found, but the have a regeneration project there in parts of the wood. There seem to be plenty of trees which have been felled or thinned over the years and plenty of others which have naturally just degenerated. So I have written to the Woodland Trust asking for permission to collect a couple of these ”insignificant” specimens come winter. I await their reply eagerly.

Beech
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Hazel
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Hawthorn (not necessarily collectible, but cool nonetheless)
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Plus lots of others, especially old beeches cut down with new shoots established.
 

Woocash

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Anyway, It was a particularly windy day but nothing to write home home about (or so I thought) so when I arrived back at the boat and saw the boat awning ripped from it’s anchor and my lovely Japanese Maple blown off it’s perch, teetering on the edge of the river bank I was quite perturbed. Awning anchored and maple repotted (not in that order, it was not too worse for wear, with only a couple of small branches broken and a bit of soil lost) I noticed another gap on the bench. My first tree gone! A Chinese elm bought for me by my girlfriend last year off the bench and into the river 😭 I grabbed my boat hook and started scrabbling around on the river bed in vain. Plan B. I ordered an endoscopic camera from amazon to be delivered quick smart. Yesterday it came.

I attached the camera to the barge pole, pointed at the hook tip and sunk it down into the 12 ft depths of the river. With my iPad as the monitor in front of me and a real life submersible scouting mission in the offing, I felt like Jacques Cousteau! Down the hook went into the murky depths, but with an optimum focal point of only 5 centimetres and a few LEDs to guide me it was like hunting for real buried treasure. I would move a bit, rotate, move a bit more, rotate and so on until I saw a flash of blue. My bonsai pot was blue. Could it be? Alas, no. It was part of a bike frame which some kindly individual had deposited at some point in the past. I carried on my mission around the frame as best I could and was just about to give up hope when a shot of some tiny, green, serrated leaves appeared on the screen. My pulse quickened and then with tiny incremental movements I located the trunk and pot. Jackpot! Now to extract.

The bike frame was proving quite a nuisance, but with only a small gap between the river bank and my 30 ton boat there was minimal space to get it out of the water, so I hooked it and moved it to the side, hopefully enough out of the way. I then had to find the tree all over again. At least I knew it was there. Eventually, I found the familiar leaves again and after several attempts and with far more luck than judgement I managed to extract it from it’s would be watery grave. Hallelujah!

A quick once over determined that although some of the soil was lost, none of the branches were broken and there was only a couple of small nicks missing from the trunk/roots, probably a result of the boat hook man handling. It even looks like it has extended some growth! Perhaps an habitual river dunking is a good tonic. Who knew?

So, it may not be a particularly good bonsai, but it was my first and to lose it it such a manner and then retrieve it when I thought all hope was gone fills me with such joy. Here’s to many more years together (and a new back stop for the bench). 🙂

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Clicio

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So, it may not be a particularly good bonsai, but it was my first and to lose it it such a manner and then retrieve it when I thought all hope was gone fills me with such joy. Here’s to many more years together (and a new back stop for the bench). 🙂
It IS a great story and I'm happy you could get it out of the water, well done!
 

Woocash

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It IS a great story and I'm happy you could get it out of the water, well done!
Muito obrigado! I wasn't expecting to be able to find it, let alone retrieve it so to be able to do both seems nothing short of a miracle really. In my rush to set up the camera for use I didn’t read up on how to take pictures with it which is a shame because it did look like something out of national geographic or the like, but hey ho, job done.
 

Boscology

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At first your story and setting made me think of a quote From Willem De Cooning to his wife, sculptor, and studio-sharer about the condition of their NYC loft circa 1950. "What we need is a wife", I may have thought this several times but I'm smart enough not to say it.

Looks like the tree is fine, and a good story to boot
 

Woocash

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Bit of a busy day today. Went to the local garden centre which always has a fairly well stocked reduced section and I managed to come away with a couple of “bargains”. A Pinus Mugo ‘Ophir’ for £15 and a Coryllus Avellana ‘Scooter’ for £12.50. Happy boy I am.

Firstly, the Mugo. It had a reasonable amount of dead needles in the interior and a few dead shoots, but otherwise seems pretty ok. I chopped the dead stuff out and did a repot using the @Vance Wood method ,as specified in the resources section. It seems to have quite a nice structure, but I’m not entirely sure which direction to go with regards to choosing a trunk line and which main branch to keep, if any of what is available. The obvious option is to choose the middle upright leader, but I’m not sure that it is the best choice from what is available. I know I want to remove at least two of the branches from the first whorl, but which too choose? Does anybody have any ideas before I make a grave error? Thanks.

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Next the Hazel. It is not in the best of health, but it still has plenty going for it. ‘Scooter’ is a new one on me, but apparently is a dwarf contorted variety with tiny leaves for a hazel and a very bulbous trunk for it’s size. These are not exactly renowned for their bonsai suitability, but this variety might just have something going for it. CF0ED633-8376-44AB-9587-DF5692C9F872.jpegDA0A6BDF-751D-4D8A-A3F3-E2C4A55FC8E6.jpeg5A5E7B3C-1EAD-4EA9-86A9-9AD705102DF5.jpeg8182D18E-5C27-4749-8DCD-F4DC26231A10.jpeg
 

HorseloverFat

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Bit of a busy day today. Went to the local garden centre which always has a fairly well stocked reduced section and I managed to come away with a couple of “bargains”. A Pinus Mugo ‘Ophir’ for £15 and a Coryllus Avellana ‘Scooter’ for £12.50. Happy boy I am.

Firstly, the Mugo. It had a reasonable amount of dead needles in the interior and a few dead shoots, but otherwise seems pretty ok. I chopped the dead stuff out and did a repot using the @Vance Wood method ,as specified in the resources section. It seems to have quite a nice structure, but I’m not entirely sure which direction to go with regards to choosing a trunk line and which main branch to keep, if any of what is available. The obvious option is to choose the middle upright leader, but I’m not sure that it is the best choice from what is available. I know I want to remove at least two of the branches from the first whorl, but which too choose? Does anybody have any ideas before I make a grave error? Thanks.

View attachment 315284
View attachment 315285View attachment 315286

Next the Hazel. It is not in the best of health, but it still has plenty going for it. ‘Scooter’ is a new one on me, but apparently is a dwarf contorted variety with tiny leaves for a hazel and a very bulbous trunk for it’s size. These are not exactly renowned for their bonsai suitability, but this variety might just have something going for it. View attachment 315287View attachment 315288View attachment 315289View attachment 315290

Dang, @Woocash , I have been missing a really neat thread of YOURS, too!

I’m here now, and happy TO be. ;)

Alsooooo I am now, officially OBSESSED with that Hazel! It ALREADY hugs and caresses “mis ojos” with... I want to say “majestic overtones”..

Suuuuper impressed/envious.

🤓
 

Woocash

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Dang, @Woocash , I have been missing a really neat thread of YOURS, too!

I’m here now, and happy TO be. ;)

Alsooooo I am now, officially OBSESSED with that Hazel! It ALREADY hugs and caresses “mis ojos” with... I want to say “majestic overtones”..

Suuuuper impressed/envious.

🤓
Thanks man 😊 I’ve not seen this particular hazel cultivar before so I’m pretty excited for it’s potential too. I was quite tempted to let it grow and see what sort of size trunk I could get on it in a couple of years, but then I thought it’s already good to go for a funky shohin so you know, snippy snip snip. There were at least a dozen to choose from though so reckon I’ll be back to get another to grow out.

Glad you like the thread so far. I’ve got a couple more posts to go but I cant upload photos at the moment for some reason. I’ll keep trying.
 

Woocash

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Next up, a bit of a prune for a privet I collected this past winter. I just removed duplicate shoots and cut all growing tips on shoots that have grown sufficiently. I purposely left one of the root suckers with the intention of creating a companion tree next door, a la Mr Pall’s jap map.
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Woocash

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Lastly, I did this one a couple of weeks ago but only got round to taking pictures today. A garden centre bought Juniperus Sabina ‘Tamariscifolia’. I didnt get any before pictures, but suffice to say there wasn't much to see but a mass of foliage. It had two trunks so I tilted it nearly 90 degrees and repotted it while hardly touching the roots. It stood proud of the top of the box slightly so I blended some sphagnum with water and pasted it over the top so the roots don’t dry out too much. Seems to work well and helped with the visualisation when doing the first styling. I’ll leave it be til next year now then repot into a cascade pot and wire out the fine branches then as well. Oh, and I wired an old branch with the intention of creating a couple of jins in the future as well.
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sorce

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Anyway, It was a particularly windy day but nothing to write home home about (or so I thought) so when I arrived back at the boat and saw the boat awning ripped from it’s anchor and my lovely Japanese Maple blown off it’s perch, teetering on the edge of the river bank I was quite perturbed. Awning anchored and maple repotted (not in that order, it was not too worse for wear, with only a couple of small branches broken and a bit of soil lost) I noticed another gap on the bench. My first tree gone! A Chinese elm bought for me by my girlfriend last year off the bench and into the river 😭 I grabbed my boat hook and started scrabbling around on the river bed in vain. Plan B. I ordered an endoscopic camera from amazon to be delivered quick smart. Yesterday it came.

I attached the camera to the barge pole, pointed at the hook tip and sunk it down into the 12 ft depths of the river. With my iPad as the monitor in front of me and a real life submersible scouting mission in the offing, I felt like Jacques Cousteau! Down the hook went into the murky depths, but with an optimum focal point of only 5 centimetres and a few LEDs to guide me it was like hunting for real buried treasure. I would move a bit, rotate, move a bit more, rotate and so on until I saw a flash of blue. My bonsai pot was blue. Could it be? Alas, no. It was part of a bike frame which some kindly individual had deposited at some point in the past. I carried on my mission around the frame as best I could and was just about to give up hope when a shot of some tiny, green, serrated leaves appeared on the screen. My pulse quickened and then with tiny incremental movements I located the trunk and pot. Jackpot! Now to extract.

The bike frame was proving quite a nuisance, but with only a small gap between the river bank and my 30 ton boat there was minimal space to get it out of the water, so I hooked it and moved it to the side, hopefully enough out of the way. I then had to find the tree all over again. At least I knew it was there. Eventually, I found the familiar leaves again and after several attempts and with far more luck than judgement I managed to extract it from it’s would be watery grave. Hallelujah!

A quick once over determined that although some of the soil was lost, none of the branches were broken and there was only a couple of small nicks missing from the trunk/roots, probably a result of the boat hook man handling. It even looks like it has extended some growth! Perhaps an habitual river dunking is a good tonic. Who knew?

So, it may not be a particularly good bonsai, but it was my first and to lose it it such a manner and then retrieve it when I thought all hope was gone fills me with such joy. Here’s to many more years together (and a new back stop for the bench). 🙂

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View attachment 313005

Lovingly.......

Dumbass!

This was the best thing I've read in a while!

Cheers!

Sorce
 

Woocash

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More pruning today. Mirabelle Plum, Prunus Domestica ssp Syriaca. Saved as a stick from the burn pile by my girlfriend on one of her volunteer days at the reserve. There’s a really nice root spread under the soil and the curious kink leaves lots of potential. It has been growing relentlessly all year so today I gave it it’s second prune. I can’t decide the best foot forward now though. It has a girth of only around an inch at the base so either I stick it in the ground/big pot for a few years to thicken it up, or the other option could be a literati type perhaps. The sinuous nature suits currently and I’m not sure how a thicker trunk would affect the interesting shape. Any thoughts?
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Woocash

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Lovingly.......

Dumbass!

This was the best thing I've read in a while!

Cheers!

Sorce
Ha! I’m glad my stupidity amuses you...

If you enjoyed reading it though, imagine how chuffed/surprised I was to get it back! Still can’t believe it.
 

Woocash

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I also gave this Field Maple a light prune, which I collected in September last year. It had/has a reasonable sized gall mite infestation so I cut off all the affected leaves with the hope that the mites were tucked up in their little globular houses and have now been dealt with. Fingers crossed.
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Clorgan

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Bit of a busy day today. Went to the local garden centre which always has a fairly well stocked reduced section and I managed to come away with a couple of “bargains”. A Pinus Mugo ‘Ophir’ for £15 and a Coryllus Avellana ‘Scooter’ for £12.50. Happy boy I am.

Firstly, the Mugo. It had a reasonable amount of dead needles in the interior and a few dead shoots, but otherwise seems pretty ok. I chopped the dead stuff out and did a repot using the @Vance Wood method ,as specified in the resources section. It seems to have quite a nice structure, but I’m not entirely sure which direction to go with regards to choosing a trunk line and which main branch to keep, if any of what is available. The obvious option is to choose the middle upright leader, but I’m not sure that it is the best choice from what is available. I know I want to remove at least two of the branches from the first whorl, but which too choose? Does anybody have any ideas before I make a grave error? Thanks.

View attachment 315284
View attachment 315285View attachment 315286

Next the Hazel. It is not in the best of health, but it still has plenty going for it. ‘Scooter’ is a new one on me, but apparently is a dwarf contorted variety with tiny leaves for a hazel and a very bulbous trunk for it’s size. These are not exactly renowned for their bonsai suitability, but this variety might just have something going for it. View attachment 315287View attachment 315288View attachment 315289View attachment 315290

So glad I'm not the only one to attempt and enjoy a coryllus!!! Very nice! Very similar shape to mine actually. Mine has similar brown tips on the older leaves, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on that?
 

Woocash

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@Woocash here's mine - lots of new growth, removed leaves with browning
Nice! The trunk looks similar to mine which doesn’t seem be too common on nursery trees in my recollection. The leaves are definitely more like the standard contorta type though. Regardless of how well they bonsai, they’ll make interesting trees to look at. @ConorDash has one and someone (can’t remember who, sorry) posted some great examples on his thread as well.

As for brown tips, I think that’s somewhat normal in garden centre trees. They don't always receive the best of care, or enough water perhaps, no shelter etc and if they’ve been in the pot for a couple of years then that wont necessarily help either. There were probably 20 to 30 others I could have chosen in the reduced section, so with COVID affecting seasonal sales cycles some lines have been neglected to make way for more saleable items. I think with proper care it’ll be fine. They’re fine in full sun, but remember hazels are generally woodland trees which grow beneath the canopy so they are perfectly happy, or maybe even prefer partial shade.
 

Woocash

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Speaking of Hazels... I dug this one up this past winter and after a bit of extra recovery time compared to others I collected it has done really well and sent out loads of multiple shoots. I made some reductions and removed the basal shoots. Big leaves means big end bonsai.
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