Alpineart's Blog

This is an update on the cast iron cedar it had been growing in a cast iron grate at a local service station when collected .This was a simple exercise to transform it into a semi cascade trainer . I have retained numerous branches to use as jins and to aid in thickening the lower trunk . A very basic hook and hold wiring was used as the shape of the trainer was already there . This will be continually pinched out at the tips to aid ramification and to attempt to maintain a compact cedar .These tree’s get bigger and bigger every year as the growth habit extends , so continuous work is required or major trimming will have to be done every year . All of these Deodor Cedars require a re-pot but with plans to move on to a bigger property this can wait as most of the ground grown stock needs removing at that’s around 1000 plants/ trainers . Ihope to have the majority out of the ground by Winter’s end .

Cheers Alpineart

This is the next batch removed from the terraces , some have had more trimming than the others as i was going to remove them last year . The trunks size and overall shape is quite different , my plan is to remove as many as possible , collecting the better trunks before time runs out . Not having the best of health this was not a planned exercise but but a fly by the seat of my pants challenge . I have potted down some of my Phoenix Grafts  in order to have a supply of bigger pots to slip these into .The junipers needed a re-pot so its is working out well . These 4 wont require much work to bring them up to a suitable standard  unlike some of the multi leader / trunk specimens but at the same time who’s in a hurry . They were in the ground for 17 years with no plans to remove them , now the fun starts , turning these into some very impressive Bonsai  after some more of these beauties are removed .

Cheers Alpineart

This is 1 of 30 Azalea’s that i will be removing from the garden and into pot’s tub’s or what ever i can get them into .I planted 75 different varieties almost 20 years ago and now with plans to pack up and move on i will remove the ones that  have the quality required for good bonsai .Starting with he largest trunks until i exhaust my pot supply i simply collect enough to keep me occupied over the Winter months .Growing in Clay and shale terraces these are easily removed and have exceptional root masses .Most of these were trimmed annually into globe shaped plants for the floral display using garden hedge trimmers . On average most are trimmed to around 1000mm x 600mm , not all have good trunks ,  this specimen has a base around 250mm x150mm , the main trunk is 60mm , on average around 30mm .Plenty of movement more so from the side .This may remain as a group planting or could be split into 2 x 2 twin trunks .The root mass after removal was around 750mm x 600mm x 100mm , so it was reduced even further to fit the 650mm x 450mm tray, over kill for this but not wanting to reduce too much running the risk of killing the plants . It will grow on until i make the final decision as to where i take it . With this trainer potted its onto the next removal , along with some trimming of the tree’s that missed out over the last 5 months . All these Azalea’s were purchased as 3 year old pot plants for the tidy sum of $1.50 . I will continually tip prune these to begin the rebuilding of the canopies for the floral display in the next flowering season or two .

Cheers Alpineart