Those Pot Materials!

[sorce]

@Gary McCarthy ....cool!
I was wondering how this thread popped back up!

I am fairly certain these, being side drain only, dry out a little slower.
I've had things come thru winter absolutely unprotected perfectly fine.....
But some I fear to have remained too wet, which may have aided in death, but coupled only with a repot too early, and my (give no furks) attitude.

I'll winter them tipped....maybe even mulched in this year.

I needed the weight on the sills, but to make a third go round....
I'll Probly embed some mesh in the bottom.

Recent ones were cured on a slightly off level surface to aid in draining.

I do always find loads of roots in the bottom layer of drainage rocks....which were sifted out of the concrete.
(Waste not!)

Watered in the morning on the hottest days...
They seem to only dry around the outer half inch...
So if you need to get a tree into a 6in pot, I'd make a 7 in circle for it.

Remember....no matter what anyone says about NOT using a colander for this reason or the other....
Any tree is gonna benefit from the oxygen flow!

Peep some other primo benefits....



See that thick wire coming out the side up there?
It's pulling that tree down where the piece of hose is protecting it...

Illustrated in this Mugo pot which was hacked up and loving the basket!



That wire is shaped like this....
So when I turn the end of the wire, it puts more pressure on the trunk to bend it down, and (not intentional) but it locks into the holes on the outside, so you can crank it down in increments over time...

Hell, I just thought how easy it would be to wrap a piece of twine around a root and be able to pull it into a new position at repotting....like guy wires for roots!

Love these pots!

Just to have the ability to guy wire branches at any and every angle is frigging great!

Biggest....

Ground layers. (Material only)




Stable muck wall glued in with loctite G02.







This Ginseng ficus was planted out to let that root escape to earth....

That root is now about 4 times as big and the material is holding up!

Oh yeah!

And they last forever!

The first ones I tied closed with cheap zip ties that broke, but the material still stands closed....so I don't even have to replace those!

Note....
I left less overlap on the newer ones....roots tend to get caught up in the overlap.

Better to fill the mold with concrete, then push in your formed material.

I put threaded rod in the big one to act as rebar.

Longer material runs can be help up with stiffy rods too.

Have many molds prepped .....
And make pinch pots with the leftovers!

Sorce

 

[sorce]

Big mold.


I searched me saying...."fucking heavy" to find this one on Matt Spinikens thread!

Sorce

 

[Gary McCarthy]

GREAT!!!

THANKS VERY MUCH for all the info!

In one of the earlier posts you mentioned you could only go 4" high. Do they loose their structure if you go taller than that? I would think if you secure the joint where they meet tightly enough the height wouldn't matter all that much.

 

[sorce]

GREAT!!!

THANKS VERY MUCH for all the info!

In one of the earlier posts you mentioned you could only go 4" high. Do they loose their structure if you go taller than that? I would think if you secure the joint where they meet tightly enough the height wouldn't matter all that much.

Edited for time capsule purposes!

This one is about 12x4 on each side...
These little structural bends did help!

But any longer or higher....and I would use a long stainless nail....or something embedded in the base to hold it up...

That big ficus one folds out in the middle of the long section.
That's what lead to this edge stiffening on this one.

Sorce

 

[sorce]

Oops...not that edited!



Sorce

 

[M. Frary]

Are you still loving these pots? Are you using them for deciduous trees? Some comments I've seen on other threads mention these types of pots tend to try out too quickly for deciduous trees.

All of my deciduous trees go into something like this.
In fact every tree goes into a colander type container for a year or two.

 

[BE.REAL]

I truly believe once you stop believing in time as a forward moving dimension you can do more within the constraints of the Suns movements!

Sorce

This is by far one of the best things I have heard in 2018!! Bravo!!!

 

[BE.REAL]

All of my deciduous trees go into something like this.
In fact every tree goes into a colander type container for a year or two.

what part of the growth stages? I am thinking sapling to refinement, if I cant ground grow of course. But you studs have more experience, so I am the sponge soaking up what your all spittin out!!!
Thank you and Bravo!

 

[sorce]

what part of the growth stages

I have a red\silver hybrid Freemans maple that started itself in one of these 4in baskets hell, maybe 3 or 4 years ago now.

Its not getting any bigger than a finger anytime soon....
But the roots remaining checked at 4in has been great for the Nebari.
And this been a half ass project.

A root can get overly fat in any year.
Colanders are a root tool to use when you don't want roots to get out of proportion.

Sorce

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

I have a couple of Sorce's pots. They are great. All trees are buried in for the winter. Photos maybe in spring.

Mesh pots and colanders do dry out more quickly than equivalent size nursery pots. Use a larger pot than you would initially use if you know your watering schedule will not keep up with the more rapid drying out.

 

[sorce]

have a couple of Sorce's pots.

You do? Ha! Nice!

Wait'll you get a load of the new ones Preso!

You know I'm hooking you up!

Sorce

 

[theone420]

Been awhile since I've actually trained it as a handlebar but here is mine......please disregard the ugly mug attached to it.

 

[SU2]

Big mold.
View attachment 155736

I searched me saying...."fucking heavy" to find this one on Matt Spinikens thread!

Sorce

F'ing WOW Sorce!!!! You the man!!!!! Dude you just saved me soooo much headache, @Vance Wood 's box-builds are - obviously - amazing, but the spectre of prepping them for the bc's & maples & nyssa's I'll be collecting in some weeks, and the ones from years-past that'll need repotting around the same time, was daunting....I needed something easy, Sorce, just look where some "zero prep, but gotsta have dat aerial-root-pruning" containers I've got in my nursery right now:


[yes, the first one is a 'large size mortar tub' that was used "as a container" for the weak-walled, metal-mesh "pot" this large BC sits in!]

Have never had 'dry out' issues, and've (obviously) been using whatever manner of "hollow boxes" and "screens" available / on-hand, but with the time-of-year dictating a good ~dozen new pottings, I've got much of my substrate "prepping" in tubs right now but just a pile of wood & screen, was going to just bite the bullet & make a ton of Vance's (amazing) style boxes, am good with such projects but they obviously take time...

Am even-better at masonry stuff though, and this idea of yours -- solid-bottom to hold the flappy sides (which can subsequently be reinforced as necessary, although you can also reduce need for that by using styrofoam instead of rocks in some of your larger containers), drainage could be drilled in after on yours but after making dozens of by-hand 'crete bonsai-containers I've found the easiest way is to simply use styrofoam 'plugs' in the mud/un-set concrete which you just pop-out after and use a grinder to smooth-out /de-burr (and to slope the area around the hole, if you're so inclined )

Thanks a ton am getting some bags of cement (I mix up my own mortars/concretes, I live in FL where my yard has free sand ), some rolls of hardware cloth to serve as "outer wall" and rolls of "shade cloth" to act as the inner walls (like my large BC's structure, only with a solid bottom - and probably a top-perimeter rim on something that size - I can actually have something I'm not afraid to look at wrong for fear of it falling apart ;P )

 

[SU2]

lol the background of the big pic has my last 'real box', the wood is burnished, has a metal-mesh bottom, has 1x1" wood runners along either side of the bottom for transport....no matter how nice it is, unless I could drill 100+ holes into that wood, when looking at it I cannot help but see roots just wrapping-around the insides of the box

 

[sorce]

I been thinking of ways to make multiples fast. Thinking about selling them since a good amount could fit into a flat rate box. Make ole Anderson stick to Windows! lol.

Sorce

 

[SU2]

I been thinking of ways to make multiples fast. Thinking about selling them since a good amount could fit into a flat rate box. Make ole Anderson stick to Windows! lol.

Sorce

I wholeheartedly support anything that promotes a horticultural move from solid, to aerated, container materials!!! Blows my mind it's not FAR more common, and while I can understand why it isn't the norm for, say, home depot packaging $5 juniper groundcovers in 1/4gal containers with sand-based soils, but for almost any serious horticultural, containerized endeavors I see aerial-pruning-containers as almost requisite now!

Especially for bonsai, I mean the results from this type of container create quicker growth (due to more feeders in a given container-volume), sure, but - for bonsai - these containers also eliminate long/circling roots while creating a dense, fine rootplate. For Development phase bonsai I see this type of container as, basically, required for "proper horticulture" here (also, it's pretty cool insofar as "long overdue re-pots" because, instead of having to cut-off thick, circling roots, you simply have a colander/etc that's jam-packed with fine roots!)

Even for when a specimen's transitioning from development to refinement, once it has a consistently homogeneous fine-feeders rootplate, you can basically cut-to-shape when root-pruning (ie to fit into smaller containers as you downsize volume while working it further into refinement)

Thanks again man, there's so many ways to approach this I think I'm gonna do a wooden one right now for a BC that needs repotting to see how flimsy of a 'wall' material I can get away with

(PS- Re "flimsy containers".....part of me has wondered, for quite some time now, whether that is even ANY issue IF simply accounted-for! IE, why not simply get burlap or shade cloth and make "free-form" containers, they'd be circular basically, you wouldn't really be able to handle them (since there'd be no structure), but in a fixed bonsai nursery that doesn't seem too big an issue (for instance I could get a BC home, prep its roots, then "wrap it up" with burlap holding the roots & substrate, and place it on my bench -- it wouldn't be getting touched, so the lack of container-rigidity would be a non-issue!)

GG to Home Depot to see what's available, am thinking my approaches (since they're for larger stuff) are going to be "double walled" IE having metal-mesh outside 'structural walls' and interior 'shade clothe' linings ;D

 

[SU2]

Make ole Anderson stick to Windows! lol.

just cannot figure out what you mean here

 

[Forsoothe!]

I tried the Terra Cotta color stain, but it looks like Hormel Chili!

Here it is with my wife's chili!

View attachment 68458

Sorce

Which is which?

 

[SU2]

I been thinking of ways to make multiples fast. Thinking about selling them since a good amount could fit into a flat rate box. Make ole Anderson stick to Windows! lol.

Sorce

Forget selling them, perfect it & open source your design so it can be improved!!

I hope I can come up with something "easily replicable" that'll scale this season, very very shortly I'll be buying hardware mesh, shade cloth and whatnot to pack up this year's collections so reallly gonna(gotta!) find something practical, for chrissakes I repotted a large guy last week and literally just put a mound of substrate onto a piece of shade cloth, rootmass onto substrate, and packed soil in as I "wrapped it", it sits atop a flat concrete planter so I can move it if/when necessary but suspect that "soft-sided, movable by virtue of resting on a flat solid bottom with handles" will be the type I settle towards....large, soft-sided containers and rigidity just don't mix

 

[W3rk]

just cannot figure out what you mean here

Anderson Flats vs. Anderson Windows. Same name/different worlds.