Old Corky bark elm

Grant Bowie · Post by **Grant Bowie** » November 23rd, 2011, 3:02 pm

Hi all,

This is an elm I have been growing for around 30 years. It started as a 4" starter that was cut off very low and grown from that new leader.

Here it is in 2006

Corky Bark Elm - GB - 2006-8-25.JPG

The branches were getting a bit lanky so

Corky Bark Elm - GB - 2010-8-18.JPG

Here it is in 2011 after a quick trim last night. It doesn't look too bad in a certain light and a bit of photo shopping.

Grants Corkybark elm Nov 2011 - black backgroun.JPG

I intend to allow the whole silhouette to expand by about 50mm this year and after multiple trims the pads should merge nicely.

Grant

Steve Warren · Post by **Steve Warren** » November 23rd, 2011, 3:29 pm

Very, very nice tree Grant. What a lovely specimen.

Steve W

siddhar · Post by **siddhar** » November 23rd, 2011, 3:34 pm

Love it! Fantastic tree Grant.

Nathan · Post by **Nathan** » November 23rd, 2011, 4:01 pm

Hi Grant

Your Elm is magic

bodhidharma · Post by **bodhidharma** » November 23rd, 2011, 4:11 pm

Indeed Grant, a wonderful tree. It will be fun rebuilding all those secondary and tertiary branches.

Grant Bowie · Post by **Grant Bowie** » November 23rd, 2011, 5:37 pm

bodhidharma wrote:Indeed Grant, a wonderful tree. It will be fun rebuilding all those secondary and tertiary branches.

Yes lots of work both during the growing season and at the start of winter; but I want it to be perfect for the May 2013 AABC Convention in Canberra.

I will probably eventually give away some of my trees to the NBPCA (if they get selected)so this might be a contender.

Grant

Grant Bowie · Post by **Grant Bowie** » November 23rd, 2011, 5:57 pm

Here it is as it was in 2005 in a very cheap pot.

Max Candy died in 2005 and his familly allowed me to purchase the white pot that it is now in.

RIMG0109.JPG

RIMG0124.JPG

I just noticed that the three top photos all have a different colour of gravel; white, dark then gold. I think i like the gold best. Carnarvon river gravel from WA.

Grant

deepeetee · Post by **deepeetee** » November 24th, 2011, 10:19 am

Hi Grant,

WOW!! Awesome.

Might be a silly question and dont really know how to put it into words but ill try, here goes....

Is the nebari/base on this, predominantly the root mass (where the moss begins)?
If so, when was it risen?
How do you stop it from drying out?

That part really adds so much age to this tree. Its just unreal.

Thanks for the pictures. It is on my desktop now

Dave

Grant Bowie · Post by **Grant Bowie** » July 8th, 2012, 5:12 pm

deepeetee wrote:Hi Grant,

WOW!! Awesome.

Might be a silly question and dont really know how to put it into words but ill try, here goes....

Is the nebari/base on this, predominantly the root mass (where the moss begins)?
If so, when was it risen?
How do you stop it from drying out?

That part really adds so much age to this tree. Its just unreal.

Thanks for the pictures. It is on my desktop now

Dave

Sorry I missed this question.

Yes base is mostly root mass at the surface.
It has risen slightly over the years by itself and I would love to get it a bit lower but that may not be possible.
It is not a thirsty tree and the flat pot actually holds a good percentage of water compared to the depth of soil.

Grant

IMG_3571.JPG

Barry1 · Post by **Barry1** » July 8th, 2012, 8:03 pm

Stunning tree Grant

fiveoffive · Post by **fiveoffive** » July 8th, 2012, 8:36 pm

Great tree.

My corky is nice but yours is great. I hope i can get mine to look as good as that one day.

Chris H · Post by **Chris H** » July 8th, 2012, 8:46 pm

Hey Grant

Fantastic tree, I love e bark.

I have a corky bark which is about 15 years old and i am restyling to shorten it and fix a one sided nebari.
Just recently all the corky bark has just started dropping off.
Big chunks just dropped off leaving a light grey bark underneath and causing reverse taper.
This hasn't happened to me before.

Is this normal in your experience?

Cheers

Chris.

Grant Bowie · Post by **Grant Bowie** » July 9th, 2012, 8:36 am

Hartos wrote:Hey Grant

Fantastic tree, I love e bark.

I have a corky bark which is about 15 years old and i am restyling to shorten it and fix a one sided nebari.
Just recently all the corky bark has just started dropping off.
Big chunks just dropped off leaving a light grey bark underneath and causing reverse taper.
This hasn't happened to me before.

Is this normal in your experience?

Cheers

Chris.

It is not normal in my experience but it might be that it is staying a bit wet. Hopefully there is no rot taking place.

Check it out and see if it is still OK at that point.

You will need a few years of strong growth to regain some corking where it has lost the bark.

Grant

Chris H · Post by **Chris H** » July 9th, 2012, 10:27 am

Ah ha. I repotted it out of akadama on sat. I decided to move it early because the akadama never seems to dry out in cold wet Sydney.

Kyushu Danji · Post by **Kyushu Danji** » July 9th, 2012, 11:11 am

Hello Grant,
I have read that some elms can be kept indoors during winter if placed in the right position. Is the corky bark elm one of them?

James

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