Show us your 3 favorite Bonsai....

[JasonG]

I figured we could do something fun to offset the political/religous thread that is grabbing all the posts....

Lets post our 3 favorite trees that we own. They don't have to be the best trees you have, just your favorites. It could be that it was your very first bonsai, a gift from a loved one or your best trees. Its up to you.

This should'nt turn into a bashing thread or anything like that, just share some pics and keep it fun. Not a competition, or anything like that....just trying to shift gears a bit and have some fun. With BT down I am sure there are some wanting to post trees.... ")

Make sense??

I will go first. I have many trees that fit the bill, but I kinda narrowed it down to these 3....in no particular order.

Vine Maple, this I collected growing on the side of a mountain and was radically changed from how we found it. This is one of my favorites because it is large, is the best Vine Maple I have seen and was the most fun to work on of any tree I have styled to date. Pictured this morning in between rain storms..... just leafing out.

Rocky Mt Juniper.
This is a favorite for obvious reasons. Said by many to be one of the best junipers in the country and I learned a TON working on this under the guidance of Walter Pall. It has only had an initial styling and will get some root work in the next few weeks.

Ponderosa Pine.
I love this tree because it was one of the first major stylings that I have done by myself. It was a major transformation from what it started out as and was a blast to work on. The results are pretty good. I removed most of the wire a few months ago and will rewire it this summer. I will also widdle the roots into a better pot over the coming few years.

NEXT.........

 

[akhater]

Shohin is not really you style is it

great trees the first is my fav

 

[JasonG]

Shohin is not really you style is it

great trees the first is my fav

I have very good shohin too...infact I am becoming more and more fond of shohin....they are much harder to work on than the big trees....

Jason

 

[amkhalid]

Jason! Awesome trees man... that little ponderosa is perhaps my favorite ponderosa I've seen.

With the vine maple - did that second trunk die or did you decide to remove it? It still looks great, but that must have been a tough decision (unless it died!)

Awesome trees... I would post something but I'm at work (obviously working very hard haha)

 

[JasonG]

Jason! Awesome trees man... that little ponderosa is perhaps my favorite ponderosa I've seen.

With the vine maple - did that second trunk die or did you decide to remove it? It still looks great, but that must have been a tough decision (unless it died!)

Awesome trees... I would post something but I'm at work (obviously working very hard haha)

Thanks amkhalid.....

On the vine maple the snd trunk died on its own....it is alive up to about 8 to 10 inches above the soil line. If you look you can see lots of new shoots coming from there. I need to remove them. I left the dead trunk long because right now it is an anchor for guy wires.

When you get home post some trees

 

[HotAction]

I don't even have 3 bonsai(s), but thanks for sharing.

-Dave

 

[JasonG]

I don't even have 3 bonsai(s), but thanks for sharing.

-Dave

Oh, c'mon Dave...only 1 of my 3 are in pots.... so do they count as bonsai? They trees though

 

[AlainK]

A scots pine, from a very young seedling taken in forest about 15 years ago. still in training, but one of my favourite :

A Japanese maple, from a cutting that was as thick as a match 12 years ago, because of its changing colours :

And a larch, from a 2-3 year-old seedling. the photo was taken two weeks ago, the foliage is more dense now :

... and :

I figured we could do something fun to offset the political/religous thread that is grabbing all the posts....

Thank you ever so much for such a sensible suggestion.

 

[JasonG]

Thanks for posting 3 nice trees! Glad to see someone else post!

 

[amkhalid]

Alright alright... I agree we need to get some bonsai on this forum... or pre-bonsai. I'm a student and have only been doing bonsai a few years... so I do what I can.

Hard to say if these are my 'favorite' trees, but I am enjoying them right now... its not nice to pic favorites

First pic is a tiny (~10cm) potentilla which I started last summer from nursery stock... deadwood still isn't finished but its close. I just repotted it from a 1 gallon nursery pot to a tiny training pot. I am letting it recover... it will be defoliated and wired a few weeks. These are nice trees in the spring but the foliage gets out of control very quickly... I have some tricks up my sleeve which may solve that problem though



The second is another small (~12cm) potentilla from nursery stock... It just had its 1st hard pruning and repot (Nick Lenz pot... too big but was the right size for now). I like how it almost has an oak-ish feel to it. I think it will have the basic branch structure done by the end of this season - again, they grow like weeds.



Final is a Korean Hornbeam stump. I like this tree because it is such a challenge. It needs branches... I have done some thread grafting on it, and am also thickening the first main branch (it had 2 ft shoots growing off it last year). Long way to go (estimating another 5 years of thickening branches and growing a new apex), but in the end I hope the hard work will pay off.



p.s. I will be in Harrisburg for Walters workshop on Friday, hopefully I will see some of you there!

Cheers

Aaron

 

[akhater]

@AlainK
WOW these are fantastic

for the last one BIG wow that you were able to acheive something like that in just 3 years

 

[cquinn]

@AlainK
WOW these are fantastic

for the last one BIG wow that you were able to acheive something like that in just 3 years

I'm doubting it was grown from seed....ha..ha..ha. Great Material!

 

[AlainK]

I'm doubting it was grown from seed....ha..ha..ha. Great Material!

My English is not so good, what I said was ambiguous : it was a 2-3 year-old seedlind when I planted it in a pot. Er, some 12 years ago

At the time, I wasn't aware that it should be put in a growing box for a few years otherwise it can take very long to form. Here is what it looked like in October 2004, before i cut off the top and use a branch from the back to form a new leader :

Much less spectacular now, but yet, I still like it

 

[Ross]

Ok, here's three from me.

 

[FourMileMarc]

My new favorite and really my first major styling of any signifigance.

A landscape rip up from one of my clients. I decided to save 3 of them and I gave one away to a friend. This is the second season since I dug them out of the ground. This one is showing good signs of vigor this year so I decided it could take the trauma.

I did not do any work on the foliage planes this year except wire them in place. Next year repot into transition box and then wait and see for super refinement.

 

[Nomiyama]

Just went out and got a few pics before it started raining too hard, here are my current 3

Trident Maple- Imported from Korea many years ago, when I purchased it was just a stump.
Bald Cypress- Collected from the swamps of East Texas.
Ponderosa pine- Purchased from you Jason a few Years ago.

 

[FourMileMarc]

An old pic of the same from 2007/8 winter.

 

[grizzlywon]

This is a fav of mine. Just cause it is unique. A olive styled like a pine.
These are old photos and taken after a hard pruning. I have a lot more leaves now and the trunk is starting to fatten up. I have it in a large grow box in full sun. I plan on showing it as a nice shohin in the next few years.

 

[shohin kid]

My very first bonsai is this kingsville boxwood

My biggest tree is this Japanese black pine

This last tree is a shinpaku I did in a workshop at the St. Louis Shohin convention, sorry for the bad pic.

Andrew

 

[davetree]

Here's my three favorite at the moment - all shohin - Kingsville boxwood, Crimson Pygmy barberry, and Goldflame spirea.