Zelkova Serrata Forest - How to achieve?

[Ozz80]

I am planning to develop a big zelkova serrata forest (tallest tree to be 50 cm or 20 inches at least) which will be something like the forest bonsai by Vaughn Bantingburch below. For that I bought 5 zelkova saplings at the first week of this May. I made a trench in the garden with a depth of approximately 25 cm (10 inches) and filled it with cheap bonsai soil. Then I planted the saplings at that trench without removing their nursery soil. I also put slabs to promote lateral root growth. After solving health issues (possibly a fungal disease) I took a few cuttings to be used as additional trees at the forest. Temperature is around 26- 28 C ( 80 - 85 F) here at this week and they started shooting in abundance at their apexes.

What will be the best strategy to achieve this design? Is it OK that I

- Let them grow freely without pruning or removing foliage this year until fall.
- Then chop to 10 cm's ( 4 inches) at late fall
- Do the rootwork next spring, remove nursery soil and replant to their spots on the ground again.
- Create movement at the new leaders by wiring at early summer.
- Follow this grow and chop method a few more years (chopping at a higher position each time) until achieving the required trunk thickness for the trees to be used at the center, while growing cuttings with the same strategy at pots for the smaller trees , and wire them when necessary.
- When trunk thickness to height ratio about 1/20 - 1/ 25 is achieved (1 inch for the tallest tree), move them to a bonsai pot at spring with the final design perspective.
- Create final ramification at the bonsai pot, (except the side trees to be ramified earlier since they will need thicker side branches to be used as the primary branches of the design)

 

[Gabler]

For deciduous trees, I would not rely on wire for movement. I would rely more on clip and grow technique. Otherwise, you have the right general idea.

 

[BobbyLane]

For deciduous trees, I would not rely on wire 'solely' for movement. I would rely more on clip and grow technique. Otherwise, you have the right general idea.

Edited it for you

 

[Ozz80]

For deciduous trees, I would not rely on wire for movement. I would rely more on clip and grow technique. Otherwise, you have the right general idea.

Thanks for your reply

 

[penumbra]

I have several young forests started, and honestly, wire is a big part of my design work. But I do not leave it on that long. Three to four months s sufficient for most of my work.

 

[rockm]

As said getting believable movement in deciduous trunks and branching is done mostly through hard pruning, re-growth and more hard pruning. Wire doesn’t work well for deciduous trees. Wired bends tend to be smooth and even as deciduous species’ wood tends to be brittle and not flexible enough to acccept dramatic bends.

The forest in your photo was developed with clip and grow. Only the ends of branches look to have been wired.

The clip and grow process can take longer than wire but it’s worth taking the time.

 

[rockm]

The photo is of Vaughn Banting’s Red Maple (drummondii) forest that is in the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum in Washington DC

This is a fall photo:

 

[Ozz80]

As said getting believable movement in deciduous trunks and branching is done mostly through hard pruning, re-growth and more hard pruning. Wire doesn’t work well for deciduous trees. Wired bends tend to be smooth and even as deciduous species’ wood tends to be brittle and not flexible enough to acccept dramatic bends.

The forest in your photo was developed with clip and grow. Only the ends of branches look to have been wired.

The clip and grow process can take longer than wire but it’s worth taking the time.

I guess there are more than 7 bends at the trunk of the biggest tree of the forest I uploaded, so it will probably take time. But if I can produce something with half of the beauty of the target design at the end, it is worth it.

Thanks for sharing the fall photo!

 

[BobbyLane]

I'd like to add that if you did want to get some movement into the trunks with wire, try to create each bend directly at the branch node. So at each node, is where you look to bend the wire to get angles or curves. That tends to give you a more convincing feel. Over time, the bends grow out and look more subtle. I have done that on this clump Elm, which will be very similar to a forest composition. Of course if you want something like in the OP, you may want to follow what others have said. Bare in mind that forest trees arent always known for being the best quality or having the best taper, quite often a bunch of straight, uninteresting stems are used.

I put early bends in these trunks, the bends are less pronounced now and beginning to look like the trees just grew this way IMHO.

Thread 'English Elm root cutting'

Jul 31, 2021

I took a few root cuttings in spring and this is the only one that survived...

a couple weeks ago i pushed it to lay flat in the soil.
so ill try to do a clump from it, earlier i selected all the strongest shoots and got some early movement in, after securing the base as not to cause any rocking while wiring

maybe next season put in the grow bed.
could be a 5 trunker. there was a few hangers on shoots i removed, too weak to bother with, just taking energy from the 5 strongest.

• BobbyLane
• Replies: 34
• Forum: Other Deciduous

• 

 

[Ozz80]

Bare in mind that forest trees arent always known for being the best quality or having the best taper, quite often a bunch of straight, uninteresting stems are used.

Thanks for your suggestion. I already have more than 20 trees in development as single trees and this will be my first forest style. Maybe at autum I can start a cedrus libani or dawn redwood forest as well. So I want this to be as good as possible.

Despite of reading and watching so much material, I was unaware that internodal movement is not preferred on decidious trees though. . I guess it is easy to get lost at details and miss important issues like that.

As for the style, I find combination of straight trunked sticks boring and do not want to spend my time for something like that. The forest in the OP has subtle movement without losing the harmony . That is what I want to achieve

 

[BobbyLane]

At your stage, this will be a good watch for you

 

[rockm]

Found this pic I took of Vaughn Bantings red maple forest about five years ago.